On May 6, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the Trump administration may proceed with a plan to bar transgender people from serving in the military. The one-page order — delivered over the dissent of the three liberal justices — lifted a ruling by a district court in western Washington state (Seattle/Tacoma) that had paused the administration’s ban.
The stay of the lower-court’s action allows the transgender exclusion to take effect while legal challenges continue, but suggests the highest court would ultimately uphold the executive branch’s right to set recruitment standards.
While big LGBTQ+ lobbies predictably denounced what they described as the Supreme Court’s sanctioning of anti-trans discrimination, not barring individuals dependent on cross-sex hormones seems a preferential exception to standard practice, rather than targeted discrimination. I discussed these issues in my Substack column, “How Trump’s Transgender Military Ban Might Be Defensible,” linked below.