Top court allows Trump to bar transgender military recruitment

The US Supreme Court yesterday authorized President Donald Trump’s administration to block the recruitment of transgender military personnel pending the outcome of litigation on the sensitive issue. The White House had asked the Supreme Court to intervene after lower courts prohibited Trump’s administration from implementing controversial restrictions on transgender service.

The administration said there is “too great a risk to military effectiveness and lethality” to allow transgender people to serve openly -- a policy enacted under Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama. The court decided by a narrow 5-4 majority to suspend prohibitions restricting transgender service as litigation moves forward in lower courts.

Under the Obama-era policy, transgender recruits were to start being accepted by July 1, 2017. The Trump administration postponed that date to January 1, 2018, before deciding to reverse the policy entirely