COLUMBUS (WCMH) — President Trump’s Wednesday morning tweets revealing a plan to reverse the Obama Administration’s ruling to allow transgender people to openly serve in the United States military is drawing opinions from both sides of the argument.
“To say that a transgender person can’t serve effectively on active duty is just not the case. It’s not supported by the history,” says Tara Allison, a Navy veteran turned attorney in Columbus.
She enlisted in 1981, then known as Todd, but says she’s always been Tara.
“There was nothing I did as Todd during my nine years on active duty that I couldn’t do now as Tara,” she tells NBC4.
Charles Crites served in the Army around the same time Tara served in the Navy. He agrees with the president’s ban.
“Causes too much controversy,” Crites says. “”It’s not about their belief, who they are, what they portray themselves as. When you’re in that tough situation, it’s very mentally tough,” he adds, referring to combat.
Tara says it’s all about being able to execute your job, regardless of gender.
“Now to pin a label of transgender on me and say, ‘you can’t serve because you’re transgender,’ that makes no sense,” she says. “I can serve if I’m a man, I can serve if I’m a woman, but I can’t serve if I’m transgender?”
At the Pentagon, members of the staff of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis appeared to have been caught unaware by Trump’s tweets.
A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, declined to answer questions about what Trump’s tweets mean for the current policy, including whether transgender people already serving in the military will be kicked out.
“Call the White House,” he said.
The White House press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump’s decision drew immediate angry responses from groups that represent transgender service members.
Matt Thorn, executive director of OutServe-SLDN, which represents the LGBT population in the military, said thousands have been serving in the U.S. armed forces without causing any issues.
“It’s an absolute absurdity and another overstep,” Thorn said. He threatened legal action if Wednesday’s decision is not reversed.
Victoria Rodriguez-Roldan, director of the Trans/Gender Non-Conforming Justice Project, National LGBTQ Task Force, said Trump “has stood against the trans community with this decision and is harming lives for the sake of political gains.”
“The military is often the last resort for people who can’t find jobs because of discrimination,” Rodriguez-Roldan said. She said the transgender community “will not stop fighting” for justice.
Already, there are as many as 250 service members in the process of transitioning to their preferred genders or who have been approved to formally change gender within the Pentagon’s personnel system, according to several defense officials.
The Pentagon has refused to release any data on the number of transgender troops currently serving. A Rand Corp. study estimated that there are between 2,500 and 7,000 transgender service members on active duty and an additional 1,500 to 4,000 in the reserves.
Transgender service members have been able to serve openly in the military since last year, when former Defense Secretary Ash Carter ended the ban. Since Oct. 1, transgender troops have been able to receive medical care and start formally changing their gender identifications in the Pentagon’s personnel system.
Carter also gave the services until July 1 to develop policies to allow people already identifying as transgender to newly join the military. Mattis announced earlier this month that he was giving military chiefs another six months to conduct a review to determine if allowing transgender individuals to enlist in the armed services would affect the “readiness or lethality” of the force.
Key concerns include whether currently enlisted troops have had medical or other issues that cause delays or problems with their ability to deploy or meet physical or other standards for their jobs. Military leaders also wanted to review how transgender troops are treated, if they’re discriminated against or if they have had disciplinary problems, defense officials have said.
They were not authorized to discuss internal deliberations publicly so spoke on condition of anonymity.