Policy changes made by President Joe Biden allowing transgender members of the military to serve openly were reaffirmed by the Defense Department on Wednesday, but a DOD official declined to say how transgender troops are affecting unit cohesion.
Former President Donald Trump attempted to bar all transgender military members from continuing to serve or from enlisting but was stopped by the court system. In the end, Trump succeeded in halting the rollout of Obama-era policies, such as allowing gender dysphoria therapy and reassignment surgery, and he required existing transgender service members to serve in their birth gender.
Biden’s two executive orders shortly after entering office go much further, allowing all qualified transgender members of the military to serve in their self-identified gender and financing gender therapy and reassignment surgeries. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin wrote a memo days later calling for a two-month review that culminated in a Pentagon announcement Wednesday.
“We proudly recognize transgender and gender nonconforming people and their continued struggle for a life of equality, security, and dignity,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters Wednesday, which is International Transgender Day of Visibility.
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“There is no place for violence and discrimination,” he added. “The United States will lead by example in the cause of advancing the human rights of LGBTQI people around the world.”
Kirby said the new policies will take effect in one month.
The Defense Department estimates there are some 2,200 transgender service members among 1.3 million active-duty members of the military. Their medical costs have totaled approximately $8 million since 2016, and Defense Director of Ascension Policy Stephanie Miller said on Wednesday that the medical costs associated with the policy changes are expected to be “very small.”
Miller, however, cited litigation in declining to respond to a question from the Washington Examiner regarding the impact of transgender service members on unit cohesion.
“There is ongoing litigation as it pertains to past policy, and so, we’re not prepared at this time to discuss either previous studies or the previous policy,” she said.
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Austin made a point to declare his support for lifting the ban on transgender people in the military in his Jan. 20 nomination hearing.
“If you’re fit and you’re qualified to serve and you can maintain the standards, you should be allowed to serve,” he told Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand when asked his position on transgender people in the military.“You can expect that I will support that throughout.”
