In a series of Wednesday morning tweets, President Donald Trump announced that the United States military has banned transgender people from serving ‘in any capacity.’
Trump’s reasoning was because the military must be ‘focused on decisive and overwhelming victory ‘, they cannot be ‘burdened with the tremendous cost and disruption’ of transgender peoples.
“After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the US military.
Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous cost and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you.”
Trump’s decision is a reversal of an Obama-era policy established in June 2016 by former Defense Secretary Ash Carter, who shifted Pentagon policy to allow transgender troops to serve openly.
Naturally, his decision was met with backlash from mostly everyone in the nation, including all sorts of celebrities who took to Twitter to voice their displeasure: