The U.S. Supreme Court has allowed President Donald Trump’s administration to enforce a ban on transgender individuals serving in the military, enabling the armed forces to discharge thousands of active transgender service members and deny enlistment to new recruits while legal proceedings continue.
According to reports, the court granted the Justice Department’s request to lift a nationwide injunction issued by a federal judge that had blocked the implementation of Trump’s order.
The Supreme Court’s brief ruling did not indicate authorship, but three liberal justices—Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson—publicly dissented from the decision.
Human rights organizations Lambda Legal and the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, representing the plaintiffs, called the Supreme Court’s decision “a devastating blow to transgender service members who have already proven their capability and dedication to defending the nation.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt called the decision “a huge victory” for Trump, stating that he and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth are “restoring a military focused on readiness and combat capability, not DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) or gender ideology.”
According to the U.S. Department of Defense, as of 2019—before Trump’s initial ban was implemented—up to 8,000 transgender individuals were serving in the military.
