President Donald Trump signed an executive order yesterday [Macau time] directing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to revise the Pentagon’s policy on transgender troops, likely setting in motion a future ban on their military service.
He also ordered troops to be reinstated who had left voluntarily or been booted for refusing COVID-19 vaccines, outlined new rollbacks in diversity programs and provided for the deployment of a space-based missile defense shield for the U.S. — all on Hegseth’s first day.
Trump and Hegseth had described parts of the anticipated orders throughout the day, but the exact language did not drop until late.
A transgender ban had been widely expected, and Trump’s order largely sets the stage for a future ban — but directs Hegseth to come up with how that would be implemented in policy.
In his order, Trump claimed that service by troops who identify as a gender other than their biological one “conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life” and is harmful to military readiness, requiring a revised policy to address the matter.
Trump had tried to ban transgender troops during his first term, but it was tangled up in the courts.
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