![\"james](\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.towleroad.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/mattis.jpeg?resize=740%2C367\")
<\/a><\/p>\nThe ACLU has asked for an immediate halt to Trump\u2019s ban on transgender military service while its lawsuit moves through the court system.<\/p>\n
From the ACLU<\/a>:<\/p>\n The motion for preliminary injunction was filed on behalf of the ACLU of Maryland and six current members of the armed forces who are transgender: Petty Officer First Class Brock Stone, Senior Airman John Doe, Airman First Class Seven Ero George, Petty Officer First Class Teagan Gilbert, Staff Sergeant Kate Cole, and Technical Sergeant Tommie Parker.<\/p>\n In the filing, the ACLU argues that a preliminary injunction is needed to ensure that irreparable harm is not done to military personnel and potential enlistees who are transgender while the case is resolved in the courts. The ACLU motion argues that the ban violates constitutional guarantees of equal protection and substantive due process as well as the statutory right to medical care that all service members enjoy.<\/p>\n \u201cMen and women<\/a> who are transgender should be allowed to serve their country rather than being exposed to this level of uncertainty and harm,\u201d said Josh Block, senior staff attorney with the ACLU\u2019s LGBT & HIV Project. \u201cWe\u2019re confident that the courts will eventually strike down this unconstitutional ban. So we\u2019re demanding a court order to prevent this shameful policy from ever being implemented.\u201d<\/p>\n At the culmination of a thorough process, the Department of Defense concluded in 2016 that there was no basis for the military to exclude transgender individuals from openly serving their country, subject to the same fitness requirements as other service members.\u00a0This review process carefully considered and rejected the notion that medical costs, military readiness, or other factors presented any reason to discriminate against transgender individuals, many of whom had already been serving with honor in silence for years.<\/p>\n Defense Secretary James Mattis (above) last month stalled Donald Trump\u2019s order <\/a>expelling transgender military service members, delaying implementation of the order until further study is undertaken.<\/p>\n Mattis\u2019s announcement was slammed by NCLR\u2019s Shannon Minter:<\/p>\n This\u2026is playing into a patently bogus strategy to make it appear that there is going to be some new \u201cstudy\u201d that will legitimate what is already a forgone conclusion: the discriminatory banning of military service by transgender people, based on a characteristic that has no bearing on their fitness to serve. The August 25 Memorandum is perfectly clear: President Trump has ordered the military to ban transgender people from serving. That ban will go into effect in about 7 months, on\u00a0March 23<\/span><\/span>. That appalling decision is not (and cannot possibly be, given its timing) based on any hastily assembled, post hoc \u201cstudy\u201d that is being cooked up now in a transparent effort to provide a retroactive fig leaf for the President\u2019s bigotry. This order is an act of pure animus toward transgender people. The military spent two years carefully reviewing all of the relevant evidence on this issue and concluded that there is no reason to exclude transgender people from military service. The cost of inclusion is literally negligible, and there is no evidence that permitting open service will have any negative impact on military readiness. The notion that there is any good faith \u201cstudy\u201d being conducted is a blatant pretext for unmitigated, vicious, baseless discrimination.<\/p>\n The post ACLU Asks Court for Immediate Halt to Trump Transgender Military Ban<\/a> appeared first on Towleroad<\/a>.<\/p>\n