Analyzing the Transgender Military Ban

A lot has happened this week. We heard Jared Kushner speak for the first time, our President turned an address to thousands of boy scouts into a political rally that included a booing of former President Obama, and John McCain returned to the Senate. On top of that, we got to see Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci in action and we witnessed a rift in the relationship between President Trump and AG Jeff Sessions.

            Unfortunately, all of the things I just listed have to do with Donald Trump, so I cannot talk about them. However, when I made that rule back in February, I said that I couldn�t talk about the President unless he did something crazy. The President and his policies are two separate things, so I can talk about his policies and not mention him.

            Earlier today, the President announced a ban on transgender people being in the military citing that the armed forces, �cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail.�

            Now this is an obvious distraction from the feud between President Trump and Jeff Sessions and the Russia sanctions controversy (Oops I can�t talk about that). Not to mention, Donald Trump did not write this tweet (it was above a 5^thgrader�s vocabulary level and didn�t include any insults).

            Even though it is a distraction that a lot of people fell for, I thought I would cover the whole thing because there is a lot of information floating around about this issue on social media right now, and not all of it is true. For example, according to a RAND study commissioned by former Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, there are currently between 1,500 and 6,630 transgenders serving in the military. However, the National Center for Transgender Equality said the number of transgender people currently serving is 15,000. Credible news sources like The Guardian reported the 15,000 number while sources like TIME reported the lower number from the RAND study. The actual number of transgender people serving right now has not been clarified by the Defense Department or the White House.

            Up until 2016, transgenders had been banned from serving in the military, a ban repealed by Defense Secretary Ashton Carter under the Obama Administration. However, he gave the Pentagon one year to figure out how they would accept transgenders into the military and accommodate their needs. When Secretary Mattis of the Trump Administration took over the job, the year had not fully elapsed and he delayed the repealing of the ban until January of 2018. This new ban, released today, really didn�t change anything since the ban had never been repealed in the first place.

            In defense of this controversial ban, Trump stated that admitting transgender people into the military would create a financial burden for their �medical costs.� While that cost is estimated to be between 2.4 million and 8.4 million dollars annually, when compared to the Defense Department�s spending on healthcare which was 49.2 billion dollars in 2014, that amount is less than half of one percent of overall military healthcare spending. So, the claim that transgender military personnel are a financial burden is completely untrue. If the Defense Department wanted to cut spending on health care, they should focus on spending less on Viagra which currently costs the military 41.6 million dollars annually.

            The real reason why this ban is causing all of the outrage is because it�s a symbolic gesture made by the President to the LGBT community. This ban purposefully excludes a specific group of people from serving their country because they are different. There is no logical reason to exclude transgender people from the military as long as they fit the physical and mental requirements to enlist. It is not a mental illness and transgender people do not present a financial burden that the military can�t handle. It�s discrimination. A lot of people have downplayed the struggles facing the LGBT community and the hate that they face every day. Tomi Lahren, a well-known conservative commentator once tweeted, �Your rights are not threatened- are you kidding me?� in reference to the Resist March in June that was raising awareness for the LGBT community. Well Tomi, those marches had a purpose to raise awareness and resist actions like the one taken by our President today. While it may not have taken away rights from transgender people, it definitely excluded them from a part of society. That�s all for this week.

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