Guidance released on Friday by the Pentagon says that any transgender troops in the military can re-enlist in the next several months, even as the department debates how broadly to enforce a ban on their service ordered by US President Donald Trump.
In a memo to military leaders, US Secretary of Defense James Mattis said a high-level panel would determine how to implement the ban.
Trump directed the military to indefinitely extend the ban, but he left it up to Mattis to decide if those serving would be allowed to stay.
Members of the US Congress have already sent a letter to Trump calling on him to reconsider.
Senator John McCain on Friday said he backed legislation that would bar the Trump administration from forcing transgender troops out of the armed forces.
McCain said in a statement that any service member, including those who are transgender, who meet the standards for military readiness and medical fitness should be permitted to serve.
“When less than 1 percent of Americans are volunteering to join the military, we should welcome all those who are willing and able to serve our country,” McCain said.
The bill is an attempt to establish protections for transgender troops in law, cutting off Trump’s efforts to kick service members out based on their gender identity.
In his memo, Mattis said the deputy secretary of defense and the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would lead a panel that would determine how the department will implement the ban.
Outside experts might be included to provide additional advice.
Mattis in his memo also said that transgender troops can continue to receive any required medical care, the Pentagon said.
That interim guidance laid out in the memo will stay in effect until Feb. 21 next year, when the Pentagon must complete its final plan on how and when transgender people may serve.
The bill supported by McCain is also sponsored by Democrat Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Jack Reed, and Republican Senator Susan Collins.
Gillibrand said she had planned to offer the measure protecting transgender troops as an amendment to the annual defense policy bill the Senate has been considering over the past several days.
However, she said the Senate’s Republican leadership “cut off debate” and blocked the amendment from getting a vote.
The legislation also requires Mattis to complete his policy review by end of the year and to provide the results to Congress.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS