President Donald Trump is expected to sign three executive orders on Monday that would reshape the military, including banning transgender service members from serving in the US armed forces, gutting the military’s Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programs, and reinstating service members with backpay who were discharged for refusing to get vaccinated from Covid-19, according to two Trump White House officials.
The orders come as Trump’s nominee to lead the Pentagon, Pete Hegseth, was sworn in as secretary of defense on Saturday. Hegseth has long stated he planned to implement major cultural changes to the military, including ending DEI practices and removing “woke” service members.
Trump had banned transgender Americans from serving in the military in 2017 during his first administration. However, former President Joe Biden issued an order in 2021 repealing the ban.
Hours after being sworn into his second term last week, Trump signed an order revoking the Biden administration’s 2021 move to allow transgender members from serving. The order Trump is expected to sign on Monday goes even further, with one official stating that it will outline new military standards regarding gender pronouns and stating that mental and physical readiness requires transgender service members to be banned from the military.
According to one official, a fact sheet regarding the executive order states that individuals undergoing transition surgery may take a minimum of 12 months to complete treatments, often involving the use of heavy narcotics. During this period, they may not be physically capable of meeting military readiness requirements and require ongoing medical care, making them unsuitable for deployment or other readiness requirements.
In 2018, there were an estimated 14,000 transgender service members in the US military, according to the Palm Center, an independent research institute that has conducted extensive research on sexual minorities in the military.
A Pentagon memo detailing the ban during Trump’s first term recommended making exceptions for transgender service members already serving in uniform, those who had joined the military under previous policies before the ban took effect, those who do not require a change in gender, and those who had been “stable for 36 consecutive months in their biological sex prior to accession.” It remains unclear if the administration’s new ban will also have exceptions.
