Trump Asks Supreme Court to Revive Ban on Transgender Troops

Lower courts had blocked the policy, saying it was not supported by evidence and violated equal protection principles.

The Trump administration on Thursday asked the Supreme Court to let it start enforcing a ban on transgender troops serving in the military that has been blocked by lower courts.

The administration’s emergency application was the latest in a series of requests asking the justices to pause decisions by trial judges that prevent it from moving forward with the blitz of executive orders Mr. Trump has signed. The Supreme Court has allowed some initiatives to proceed and temporarily blocked others, issuing orders that have for the most part been technical and tentative.

The new case concerns an order issued on the first day of Mr. Trump’s second term. It revoked an executive order from President Joseph R. Biden Jr. that had let transgender service members serve openly.

A week later, Mr. Trump issued a second order saying that expressing what it called a false “gender identity” conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an “honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life,” and that requiring others to recognize a “falsehood is not consistent with the humility and selflessness required of a service member.”

In February, the Defense Department implemented Mr. Trump’s order, issuing a new policy requiring all transgender troops to be forced out of the military. According to the Defense Department, about 4,200 current service members, or about 0.2 percent of the military, are transgender.

Service members sued to block the policy, saying it ran afoul of the Constitution’s equal protection clause.

In March, Judge Benjamin H. Settle, of the Federal District Court in Tacoma, Wash., agreed, issuing a nationwide injunction blocking the ban.

The government had failed to show that the ban “is substantially related to achieving unit cohesion, good order or discipline,” wrote Judge Settle, who was appointed by President George W. Bush. “Although the court gives deference to military decision making, it would be an abdication to ignore the government’s flat failure to address plaintiffs’ uncontroverted evidence that years of open transgender service promoted these objectives.”

The U. S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit refused to block Judge Settle’s ruling while it considered the administration’s appeal.

The administration then sought emergency relief from the Supreme Court, saying that “the district court’s injunction cannot be squared with the substantial deference that the department’s professional military judgments are owed.”

At a minimum, the government’s application said, the Supreme Court should limit Judge Settle’s ruling to the plaintiffs in the case and lift the balance of the nationwide injunction.

The court told the plaintiffs to file their brief opposing the ban on May 1, and the justices will probably rule on the government’s application not long after.

Judge Settle’s ruling followed a similar one from Judge Ana C. Reyes of the Federal District Court in Washington. “The law does not demand that the court rubber-stamp illogical judgments based on conjecture,” wrote Judge Reyes, who was appointed by Mr. Biden.

The District of Columbia Circuit entered an “administrative stay,” saying the brief pause “should not be construed in any way as a ruling on the merits.” That court is expected to rule shortly on the government’s request that it block Judge Reyes’s ruling while the appeal proceeds.

Early in his first term, President Trump announced a transgender ban on Twitter, but the policy was blocked by two federal judges.

Those injunctions were lifted by the Supreme Court in 2019 by a 5-to-4 vote, allowing a revised ban to take effect while legal challenges moved forward. The cases were dropped after Mr. Biden rescinded the ban.

In its application on Thursday, the administration said the policy blocked by the justices in 2019 was materially identical to the new one and urged them to rule the same way now.

The Trump Administration’s First 100 Days

• Challenging Migrants’ Due Process Rights: White House officials are eschewing normal legal processes as they ramp up deportations, saying there is no time to afford unauthorized immigrants any rights — and that they don’t deserve them anyway.
• Approval Rating Falling Steadily: Trump’s approval rating has sunk to about 45 percent, down from 52 percent one week after he took office.
• Musk Backs Away: As Elon Musk moves to spend less time in Washington, it is unclear whether his plan to overhaul the federal bureaucracy will have lasting power. The endeavor has still not come close to cutting the $1 trillion he vowed to find in waste, fraud and abuse.
• Oil, Gas and Mining Projects: The Trump administration plans to dramatically reduce environmental reviews before permitting drilling and mining projects on public lands and in federal waters.
• Private Dinner for Memecoin Investors: A website promoting $TRUMP, the president’s so-called memecoin, announced that the largest buyers would be invited to meet President Trump. It was, in effect, an offer of access to the White House in exchange for an investment in one of the president’s crypto ventures.
• Meals on Wheels: A tiny division responsible for overseeing services for people with disabilities and older Americans, including programs like Meals on Wheels, is being dismantled as part of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s overhaul of his department.

How We Report on the Trump Administration

Hundreds of readers asked about our coverage of the president. Times editors and reporters responded to some of the most common questions.