A U.S. appeals court on Monday said the Trump administration could for now bar transgender people from enlisting in the military but blocked the expulsion of current service members while a lawsuit plays out.
A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, in a 2-1 ruling, said the 2025 policy was unlawfully motivated “by the bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group.”
But the Pentagon has broad powers to set enlistment standards, the court said and can continue to ban transgender people from newly entering the military pending the outcome of a lawsuit by transgender current and would-be service members.
“It appears to us to be a much greater hardship to end a military career than to delay the start of one,” wrote Circuit Judge Robert Wilkins, an Obama appointee.
Circuit Judge Justin Walker, a Trump appointee, dissented, saying courts “have neither the expertise nor the authority to decide whether the military can exclude the plaintiffs from its ranks.”
A Partial Victory With Limits
Jennifer Levi of LGBTQ rights group GLAD Law applauded the decision. “This decisive ruling confirms that the Trump Administration has no legitimate basis to discharge transgender service members who have met every demanding standard,” Levi said.
Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth signalled the government would appeal to the Supreme Court, writing “See you at SCOTUS” on X.
The ruling partially upholds a 2025 decision by a Washington D.C. federal judge who had blocked the entire policy, ruling it amounted to sex discrimination and likely violated the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection.
A Broader War On Transgender Rights
Trump’s January 2025 executive order declared that adopting a transgender identity “conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honourable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle.”
The military ban is part of a broader administration effort to eradicate transgender recognition across American life.
Federal agencies have dropped lawsuits on behalf of transgender workers, ended settlements benefiting transgender students and launched investigations into hospitals providing gender-affirming care to minors.
The military has about 1.3 million active-duty personnel. Transgender rights advocates estimate as many as 15,000 transgender service members, though officials put the figure in the low thousands.
The Supreme Court in May 2025 had allowed the policy to be implemented, though it offered no reasoning and may have ruled on a technicality rather than the merits, Wilkins noted.
(with inputs from Reuters)
