Trump nod to transgender ban in army

Memo also halts the use of government funds for active personnel’s sex reassignment surgeries.

US President Donald Trump signed a memorandum on Friday that directs the US military not to accept transgender men and women as recruits and halts the use of government funds for sex-reassignment surgeries for active personnel unless the process is already underway.

The memo, released by the White House, laid out in more detail a ban on transgender individuals serving in the armed forces that Trump announced via Twitter last month, reversing a policy shift started under his predecessor, president Barack Obama.

In it, Trump directed the Department of Defence and Department of Homeland Security to stop using government funds for sex-reassignment procedures unless it is necessary “to protect the health of an individual who has already begun a course of treatment to reassign his or her sex,” the memo said.

The order requires Defence Secretary Jim Mattis to determine in the coming months how to handle transgender individuals currently serving in the military using criteria including “military effectiveness and lethality,” budget constraints and law.

A White House official who briefed reporters about the memo declined to specify whether transgender service men and women who are currently active in the military could continue to serve based on such criteria.

The official said Trump decided the Obama administration had not identified a sufficient basis for changing what was then long-standing policy on transgender troops.

The memo called on Mattis to submit a plan to Trump by February 21, 2018, on how to implement the changes.

The change drew swift criticism from advocates of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights.