President Donald Trump He is expected to sign a new executive order Monday restricting transgender troops from serving in the military.
The new order is required by the Minister of Defense Pete Hegseth To update medical standards to ensure they “prioritize readiness and lethality” and take action to “end the use of fictitious and identifying pronouns within the DOD,” according to a White House document reviewed by Fox News Digital.
The order also restricts sleeping, changing and bathing by biological sex. It is not an immediate ban, but a direction for the Secretary of Defense to implement such policies.
Terminates the former president Joe Biden’s The White House executive order claims it “allowed special circumstances to accommodate ‘gender identity’ in the military – to the detriment of military readiness and unit cohesion.”
The order builds on another directive Trump issued last week that revoked a Biden-era order that allowed transgender people to serve in the military.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth Says “No More DEI in Defense Department”: “No Exception”
On the campaign trail, Trump promised to roll back the transgender troop ban he imposed during his first term. In his inaugural speech, he said that he would officially recognize that there are only two genders: male and female.
Trump’s new order requires Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to update medical standards to ensure they “prioritize readiness and lethality” and take action to “end the use of fictitious and identifying pronouns.” (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)
An estimated 9,000 to 14,000 service members are transgender – exact figures are not publicly available.
Between January 1, 2016 and May 14, 2021, the DOD reportedly spent approximately $15 million to provide gender confirmation care (surgical and non-surgical care) to 1,892 active-duty service members, according to the Congressional Research Service.
The move comes as part of a campaign by Trump and Hegeth to eliminate any diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices in the military. And GOP lawmakers successfully included an amendment in their 2025 defense policy bill that would ban irreversible transgender care for minors in the military health care system.
Advocates protest Trump’s transgender military ban in his first administration.
Hegseth, pictured accepting his children after his confirmation, vowed to eradicate Dei in the military. (Roberto Schmidt/AFP)
The White House OPM is ordering all DEI offices to close by the end of the day Wednesday
The order of the day bans the DEI policy across the federal government already aside 395 bureaucrats, Fox News Digital reported.
An order requiring the federal government to recognize only two genders has banned the use of taxpayer money for “transgender services” after reports that some inmates received government-funded transgender care. Medicaid, in some states, currently covers such treatments.
Also, according to that order, federal prisons and shelters for migrants and rape victims are to be separated by biological sex. It would block requirements in government facilities and workplaces to refer transgender people to use pronouns that align with their gender. Trump’s team says the requests violate the First Amendment’s freedom of speech and religion.
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The order does not issue a national mandate Which bathrooms can be used by transgender people or in which sports competitions they can participate, although many states have enacted laws in these areas.
