A federal appeals court has impeded the Trump administration from discharging trans-identified service members from active duty while a legal dispute to the policy advances.
By Catholics for Catholics
In a setback in the fight against progressive ideology in the military, a federal appeals court has impeded the Trump administration from discharging trans-identified service members from active duty while a legal dispute to the policy advances.
On Monday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in an opinion published upheld a lower court ruling stopping the Trump administration from discharging trans-identified service members from active duty, according to a story by The Christian Post.
Nevertheless, the appellate court vacated a ruling deducing that the Trump administration’s refusal to enlist new trans-identified service members was unconstitutional.
Appointed to the bench by former President Barack Obama, Judge Robert Wilkins penned the majority opinion.
A week after his second term began, President Donald Trump issued an executive order declaring that “expressing a false ‘gender identity’ divergent from an individual’s sex cannot satisfy the rigorous standards necessary for military service.”
Trump’s executive order also declared that “Beyond the hormonal and surgical medical interventions involved, adoption of a gender identity inconsistent with an individual’s sex conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life.”
“A man’s assertion that he is a woman, and his requirement that others honor this falsehood, is not consistent with the humility and selflessness required of a service member,” the order added.
In February 2025, the U.S. Department of Defense implemented a policy announcing that “Service members who have a current diagnosis or history of, or exhibit symptoms consistent with, gender dysphoria will be processed for separation from military service.”
But a group of trans-identified service members who are currently serving in the military and policies violated the equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
They asserted that “the Hegseth Policy is not based on any legitimate governmental purpose, instead ‘reflect[ing] animosity toward transgender people because of their transgender status.”’
In his dissenting opinion, Judge Justin Walker depicted the majority opinion as a violation of “the longstanding tradition of deference to military decision making” by the judicial branch.
“The military is a distinct constitutional system, separate from civilian society,” Walker stressed. “Its rules are necessarily different from those of civilian society,” and therefore, “courts do not apply the same standards to military rules as they do to the rules of civilian society.”
“Only the Executive and Congress are responsible for system-wide military judgments about the composition of the armed forces. The Supreme Court has never assumed that role for itself. Neither has the D.C. Circuit. Not until today,” he concluded.
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