The nation’s top military officer sent a memo to senior leaders and commanders worldwide Thursday saying there will be no change to the Pentagon policy barring discrimination against transgender troops until there are further orders from the military’s civilian leaders.
“There will be no modifications to the current policy until the President’s direction has been received by the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary has issued implementation guidance,” said Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, according to a memo provided to the Washington Examiner.
Pentagon sources say only a small handful of top Pentagon officials knew of the president’s decision to ban service by transgender troops in any capacity, before he announced it in a trio of tweets Wednesday morning.
As chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Dunford is the principal military adviser to the president, but so far his office has not said if he was personally consulted, or provided advice of the unexpected move to discharge all transgender troops and bar any more from enlisting.
In his Wednesday tweet, Trump specifically said he made his decision “after consultation with my Generals and military experts.” But a spokesman for Dunford would neither confirm nor deny reports that the general had no idea the transgender ban was coming, nor would he say whether the chairman provided any advice on the subject.
“The conversations between the chairman and the president are private and confidential,” said Navy Capt. Greg Hicks, saying the confidentiality extends to not only the content of the conversations, but also to whether they even took place.
Asked who the president might be referring to as “my Generals,” Hicks said, “I would ask the president and the White House to characterize that portion of the statement.”
In his memo, Dunford acknowledged “there are questions about yesterday’s announcement on the transgender policy by the President,” but stressed that until further guidance is received transgender troops remain full-fledged members of the armed forces.
“In the meantime, we will continue to treat all personnel with respect,” Dunford said. “As importantly, given the current fight and the challenges we face, we will remain focused on accomplishing our missions.”
Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, was more blunt.
“We don’t have guidance. We have a tweet. We don’t execute policy based on a tweet,” he said.
A spokesman for another member of the Joint Chiefs, Marine Commandant Gen. Robert Neller, expressed a similar sentiment.
“We’ll see what implementation guidance the secretary of defense offers. Until then, nothing changes for us,” said Lt. Col. Eric Dent.
“We continue to treat all Marines with the respect and dignity that they rightfully deserve. We have tens of thousands of Marines forward deployed doing great things for our nation, our allies and partners — important work that we will continue to do, as a team,” Dent said.
