When an Army Major Came Out as Transgender, the Military Embraced Her...

[Jessica_Rose]

When an Army Major Came Out as Transgender, the Military Embraced Her. Soon, the Pentagon May Not (Exclusive)

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/when-an-army-major-came-out-as-transgender-the-military-embraced-her-soon-the-pentagon-may-not-exclusive/ar-AA1yebSk?ocid=windirect&cvid=e5c02766da1448ccb4dc650a8105b5b6&ei=132

Story by Jeff Truesdell (1 Feb 2025)

U.S. Army Maj. Alivia Stehlik, a transgender officer assigned to the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Ky., knows how it feels to face a challenge.

"I'm Ranger-qualified, I'm Airborne-qualified, I've jumped out of planes, I've repelled out of helicopters, I've deployed to the farthest corners of Afghanistan," Stehlik tells PEOPLE. "I've done all of the Army things that they need me to do, and I'm a physical therapist, so I understand the medical and readiness pieces of being a soldier."

"We have almost a decade of open transgender service," she says. "All of the service chiefs have said, we've had no disruptions to readiness, no disruptions to unit cohesion, no disruptions to deployability. Those are our senior, four-star leaders in all of the Armed Services. They testified to that."

"Being trans is really no more interesting than me having brown hair or brown eyes. It's just a vague descriptor of who I am or a characteristic that I have, but it's not relevant to my combat ability," she says. "I'm fully ready to deploy with my unit tonight if that happens, if we get called on."

"I'm just resolved, and so are my trans service peers," she adds. "We're here and we are ready. We're resilient, we're deployable, we're currently deployed, and we're going to stick around and do our job."