BREAKING: DOJ appeals block on Pentagon's transgender military ban
The U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday appealed a federal district court judge's ruling that blocks enforcement of the Trump administration's ban on transgender military service.
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The appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit comes one day after U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes denied the administration's emergency request to dissolve a preliminary injunction she issued on March 18 in Talbott v. Trump, a lawsuit brought by 32 trans plaintiffs challenging the ban.
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In her Wednesday opinion, Reyes wrote that the federal government 'cannot evade discriminating against transgender people simply by labeling the policy as addressing gender dysphoria.' She also denied the government's request to stay the injunction pending appeal.
Reyes' order blocking the ban is scheduled to take effect at 7 p.m. Eastern on Friday. The ruling halts the implementation of the policy laid out in President Donald Trump's Executive Order 14183 and the accompanying 'Hegseth Policy,' which attorneys for transgender service members suing the government say would result in involuntary separation of active-duty transgender military members and deny entry to transgender recruits.
Related: Judge reinstates nationwide stop to Trump's trans military ban
'The government respectfully requests a stay pending appeal and an immediate administrative stay by March 28 at 7:00 P.M., when the district court stay expires,' DOJ lawyers wrote to the D.C. Circuit Court. 'Absent this relief, the military will be forced to continue implementing a policy that the Department has determined is not compatible with military readiness and lethality.'
The DOJ claimed Reyes 'substituted [her] judgment for that of the military."
Reyes had ruled that the government failed to show how transgender people serving in the military are detrimental to the armed forces. She highlighted that the government's studies, which the Pentagon relied on to generate the policy, indicate that trans troops can serve and deploy more than their cisgender counterparts diagnosed with depression. Reyes also noted that the Department of Defense spends exponentially more money on erectile dysfunction medication annually than it does for gender-affirming care. She ruled that the only reason for the ban is that government leaders don't like transgender people.
Following the decision, the plaintiffs' legal teams issued statements condemning the administration's attempt to reinstate the ban.
'These efforts to stall the preliminary injunction from going into effect to protect our transgender troops burden military families with a crushing amount of pressure as they navigate a limbo with outcomes that will cause devastating harms to the military careers of these incredible soldiers,' said Jennifer Levi, GLAD Law's senior director of transgender and queer rights.
'This motion was nothing more than a last-ditch tactic to sow confusion and cause delay. There is no way to defend a policy that seeks to recklessly discard thousands of highly trained, skilled, and decorated transgender servicemembers, many of whom have deployed to critical locations across the globe,' Shannon Minter, legal director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, said. 'The government has conceded it has no evidence to support its position and no reason to discharge individuals who are serving capably and honorably.'
Reyes had previously ruled that the policy is likely unconstitutional and wrote in her March 18 opinion that it 'fails intermediate scrutiny and is motivated by animus.'
The D.C. Circuit will now consider the DOJ's appeal.
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