It was July 26, 2017. Three and a half years ago, almost to the day when President Donald Trump shocked the nation with a series of tweets that seemed to have come out of nowhere.
“After consulting with my generals and military experts, it is pointed out that the United States government will not accept or allow transgender people to serve in any capacity in the US military. Our military must focus on a decisive and overwhelming victory and not be burdened with the enormous medical costs and disruption that transgender people in the military would bring, ”read Trump’s tweets. “Many Thanks.”
The commander in chief had just imposed a total ban on members of the transgender service. Just like that, in next to no time.
Literally every word of that statement was a lie.
A few hours ago President Joe Biden lifted the ban through an executive order.
Trump had not consulted with his generals or military experts. Transgender service members do not bear enormous medical expenses, nor do their jobs cause disruption. Even the thank you seemed wrong.
Civil rights and LGBTQ organizations have been sued in federal courts and won multiple times.
But the US Supreme Court bowed to Trump, as it often did during his tenure, and granted him the “right” to ban all members of the transgender military service.
It wasn’t until later that Americans learned that Trump made the announcement not only for purely political reasons, but also at the urging of some of the most powerful partisans of the far-right and the religious right.
Among them are anti-LGBTQ hate group leaders Tony Perkins, President of the Family Research Council. Less than a year later, Trump would appoint him directly to the administration to serve on the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. Perkins is now the chairman of that group. Trump canceled his trans ban just days after Perkins asked him to.
See Also: Longtime BFFs Mike Pence and Tony Perkins reportedly starred and drafted the Pentagon ban on transgender service members
Also, Ginni Thomas, the conspiracy theorist and far-right lobbyist who happens to be the wife of the Supreme Court Clarence Thomas. She met with Trump in January 2019, apparently in part to force him to pass the ban he had announced 18 months earlier and which was being tried in court.
And then-Congressman Mark Meadows (R-NC), who would later become Trump’s chief of staff in the White House, reportedly played a “significant role” in enforcing the transgender military ban. (Politico reports today that Meadows, who has now been fired from the White House, is so unemployed that he will now be forced to take a job with the Trump organization after the presidency.)
According to ThinkProgress, Arkansas mega-church pastor Ronnie Floyd, who also sat on Trump’s evangelical council with Perkins, “had the president’s ear and used it to prevent transgender people from serving their country.”
Floyd joined other evangelical leaders in the White House two weeks before Trump announced last year’s Twitter ban, where they openly campaigned for the president to reverse the Obama administration’s decision to serve trans people.
Trump’s banned transgender service staff out of the blue had more to offer.
Perkins, adds ThinkProgress, “personally campaigned for Trump to advocate the ban, admitting it would come when the military leadership did not. Perkins also contributed to a secret working group led by Vice President Pence to override any trans-friendly recommendations made by a military study group. Documents show that the official military body only heard testimony for the permission of trans people, but the final recommendations somehow called for the opposite.
And then there is Vice President Mike Pence.
According to Slate in 2018, “a panel of experts” produced a report, also released on Friday, that is supposed to provide a fake justification for Trump’s ban. According to multiple sources, Vice President Mike Pence played a leading role in preparing this report, along with Ryan Anderson, an anti-trans activist, and Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council, an anti-LGBTQ lobby group. “
“The Republicans of the House planned to pass an expense bill that was piled with his election promises, including money to build his border wall with Mexico,” Politico reported at the time. “But an internal republican struggle for transgender troops threatened to blow the bill. And GOP insiders in the House feared they might not have the votes to pass the laws because the Defense Hawks wanted a ban on Pentagon-funded sex reassignment surgery – something GOP leaders wouldn’t give them. “
They turned to Trump, who did not hesitate. In the blink of an eye he announced that transgender troops would be banned altogether.
In other words, he didn’t turn a blind eye, just made up a lie to advance his agenda. I didn’t even think twice about the tens of thousands of lives that would be affected.
Two years later, he was still lying about the ban.
“They take huge amounts of drugs,” Trump told a British news agency about transgender people, which is a lie, “they have to – and besides, you can’t do drugs in the military and you have to after that.” Business.”
These “drugs,” NBC News reported when Trump made the offensive remarks, are prescription drugs, and “the military does not prohibit service members from using prescription drugs, including hormones.”
HRC posted this video at the time:
The total cost of expanding medical care to trans-service members would be a fraction of 1% of the military’s total health budget.
It is deeply disturbing that @realDonaldTrump used his time on foreign soil to spread lies about the brave transsexuals who serve in uniform. pic.twitter.com/ryY2xZRB5v
– Human Rights Campaign (@HRC) June 5, 2019
Image: Official White House photo of Shealah Craighead via Flickr
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