Meet the Trans Troops the Trump Administration Is Barring

New York Times

27-02-2025

Meet the Trans Troops the Trump Administration Is Barring
Sgt. First Class Julia Becraft circled up a dozen infantry soldiers at Fort Cavazos, Texas, and introduced herself as their new squad leader. She let them know they were in experienced hands: She had deployed to Afghanistan three times, seen a fair share of combat and been awarded the Bronze Star.
Also, she told them, she was transgender.
She had worried about this moment since transitioning a year earlier. How would the soldiers react? Would they accept a trans woman as their leader?
For a few seconds, no one spoke. Then there were nods of acceptance. Other soldiers started introducing themselves as well, sharing something about their own lives.
Then they all went to do morning physical training, just like every other squad in their battalion.
'At first, you could tell some were surprised,' Sergeant Becraft recalled earlier this year. 'But they saw I was genuine and respected my experience. Me being transgender just wasn't that much of a thing.'
Sergeant Becraft does not recognize herself in the Trump administration's portrayal of transgender service members. The administration says, without providing evidence, that trans troops saddle the government with costly health care and corrode military effectiveness. An executive order last month asserted that being transgender 'conflicts with a soldier's commitment to an honorable, truthful and disciplined lifestyle.' Late on Wednesday, the Defense Department released a memo saying that trans troops now serving would be forced out.
'It is the policy of the United States government to establish high standards for service-member readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity and integrity,' the memo explaining the policy said.
Essential troops may be able to get a waiver, the policy states, if they can show 'compelling government interest in retaining the service member that directly supports warfighting capabilities.'
Some trans military members are challenging the policy in court.
Trans troops say their experiences in uniform hardly fit the dark descriptions of their critics. In two dozen interviews, many told The New York Times that despite the dire depictions being transgender in the military is no big deal.
The troops interviewed — three pilots, an explosives expert, a special operations officer, a nuclear reactor supervisor, a flight nurse, a missile battery commander and others — said they have faced some institutional barriers and heard a few cutting comments. But mostly, they say, they have been treated with respect. Their leadership has supported them, their peers have accepted them, and they have earned good performance reviews and promotions.
Officers and troops who are not trans said in interviews they had not seen any negative impact from trans troops.
Not that coming out was easy. Many of the trans troops said it was hard to come to terms with something they had been trying to deny for years. Sergeant Becraft's marriage didn't survive. But when she told the Army that she was trans, her brigade offered her a temporary desk job with a more flexible schedule while she began her transition and went to therapy. A year later, she returned to leading soldiers.
'If anything, since I've transitioned, I've become a better leader,' Sergeant Becraft said in an interview before the ban was announced. 'I'm more comfortable. I don't have to hide anything. Now, maybe, I have more wisdom, and I think my soldiers respond to that.'
Before the decision to discharge all trans soldiers was announced, she had hoped to be promoted to platoon sergeant this spring.
Many trans troops, like millions of others in America, saw the military as a patriotic pathway for opportunity — one that has become open to an increasingly diverse group of Americans.
The policy on trans military service, however, has been a tug of war between competing visions of the military for a decade. In 2016, six years after he signed a bill to let gay service members serve openly, President Barack Obama lifted a ban on transgender service. The next year, President Donald J. Trump announced a new ban, which President Joseph R. Biden Jr. reversed in 2021.
During the Biden administration, thousands of trans service members who had been serving in uniform for years came out.
Even so, trans troops still make up only a tiny portion of the armed forces. The military says it does not keep a tally, but outside estimates say they account for less than 1 percent of the two million people in uniform.
Many of them volunteered to serve not yet recognizing that they were transgender.
Chief Warrant Officer Jo Ellis was just out of high school in 2009 when she joined the Army National Guard as a helicopter mechanic. She deployed to combat as a door gunner, then became a Black Hawk helicopter pilot. In 2021, while going through the military's brutal survival school, where pilots endure mock torture, sleep deprivation and solitary confinement, she had a sudden realization that she was trans.
'I had been raised very conservative, church twice a week, home-school,' Ms. Ellis said. 'Throughout my life, I was plagued by the desire to be a woman, but I never understood why. And suddenly I was so exhausted that I had no defenses left, and it just smacked me in the face.'
Worried that coming out would ruin her career, she hid how she felt for two years.
'Maybe there were trans people serving somewhere in the Army, but definitely not in my unit,' she said. 'We're a very blue-collar, good-old-boy-type environment.'
'I assumed the worst, but I was wrong,' she said. 'When I came out, everyone in my unit just opened their arms to me.''
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has called trans troops 'weird' and 'a distraction.' A number of military officers who have commanded units with trans troops said that was not their experience.
'They've tried to make a big deal out of this, just like they did in the past with integrating women or African Americans, but it's just a nothing-burger,' said Capt. Justin Long, who retired from the Navy in 2023 after more than 20 years in uniform. 'I've had 15 trans sailors in my command over the years and never had an issue. The other sailors treat them like anyone else. All they want to know is, Will you show up and do your job?'
In recent years, the military has looked at gender affirming medical care the same way it has regarded broken bones, cancer diagnoses or scores of other medical issues that troops encounter. To receive treatment, there must be a diagnosis, a treatment plan and coordination with commanders to avoid interference with deployments or critical training.
'We don't treat them any differently, and we shouldn't,' Captain Long said.
He said that forcing all trans troops out ignores the recommendations of senior leaders, and 'flies in the face of science and reality.'
The Trump administration also claimed the cost of gender-affirming care is too high — though it has not offered any figures.
The Defense Department says it doesn't track how much it spends on such transition care. Studies of civilian health systems suggest that the cost varies widely from one individual to another. Some need hormone medications that cost about as much as birth control pills, while others receive surgical procedures that can add up to $100,000 or more. In a health care system as vast as the U.S. military's, studies suggest that the overall cost is tiny.
But there is another cost that is rarely mentioned, said Cmdr. Emily Shilling a decorated Navy fighter pilot who has flown 60 combat missions: the cost of losing highly trained service members.
Commander Shilling is the president of SPARTA Pride, an advocacy organization for trans troops. She said many trans troops are people like her: senior personnel who will be difficult and expensive to replace.
The Navy spent millions of dollars on her training and flight hours, and sent her to graduate school to prepare her for greater responsibilities, she said. She now helps to oversee a multibillion-dollar carrier-launched drone program.
'We're an extremely valuable asset to just throw away,' Commander Shilling said. 'Why would you want to get rid of someone you have so much invested in?'
The new policy makes clear that even people who transitioned years before, and are unlikely to represent any extra costs or time lost for the armed forces, can no longer serve.
Paulo Bautista transitioned more than 10 years before he joined the Navy. His surgery was done, his hormone levels were stable, and the emotional turmoil of the process had long ago settled into a quiet confidence.
The only gender-related medical care he requires is a weekly testosterone shot. The military provides the same shots to about 5,000 men in uniform who are not trans and have low testosterone levels.
'Honestly, most people don't even know I'm trans, unless I tell them,' he said.
During the first Trump administration, trans troops who had already started their transition in uniform were allowed to keep serving. Many who came out under the old regulations are shocked that this time they are being forced out.
Petty Officer Second Class Sam Rodriguez joined the Navy as a diesel mechanic, then served as a military prison guard. While working at the prison, Petty Officer Rodriguez, who is nonbinary and uses the pronouns they and them, got married, had two children and studied at night for a master's degree. Last fall, the Navy selected them to commission as an officer and train as a clinical social worker.
But the military now sees them as unfit to serve, and they face mandatory discharge. But before the new policy was announced, they saw their identity as an asset to the Navy.
'Since I've been on both sides of gender, and both sides of enlisted and officer experience, I have a lot of lived experience that will help me relate to people,' they said. 'I joined the Navy to be part of the greater good, and giving good health care to people who serve is part of that.'
Petty Officer Rodriguez said it was difficult at times to fit in to a military that dresses and houses troops based strictly on two genders. Forced to check a box, they reluctantly picked 'male.'
'It can feel like you are an invisible person,' Petty Officer Rodriguez said. 'But I realize we all have to make sacrifices, and that's something I decided I was willing to do to keep serving.'
Now, they feel they are being punished for following regulations, and wonder if that sacrifice was for nothing.
As Petty Officer Rodriguez contemplated being forced out, they asked, 'What will I do for my family?'