Attorneys urge appeals court to see Trump's trans military ban is rooted in bigotry, not national securityhttps://www.advocate.com/news/talbott-trans-military-case-update 🔗Christopher Wiggins (6 Nov 2025)
The legal fight over President Donald Trump's revived ban on transgender military service intensified Thursday as attorneys and plaintiffs in Talbott v. United States pressed the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold a lower court's injunction blocking what they call "unconstitutional animus toward transgender people."
In a newly filed appellate brief, lawyers for a group of transgender service members and recruits argued that the policy, first announced in Executive Order 14183 and implemented by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, has no factual foundation. "There is no evidence to support the ban," they wrote, noting that during oral arguments, government lawyers conceded that each active-duty plaintiff is "honorable, truthful, and disciplined," physically and mentally fit to serve, and has "made America safer."
Despite those admissions, the policy orders their discharge solely for being transgender, which attorneys called "clear, unconstitutional discrimination targeting service members based on who they are rather than whether they can do the job."
U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes agreed earlier this year when she granted a nationwide preliminary injunction halting enforcement of the ban. In her opinion, Reyes found that the Trump administration's stated justifications — readiness, cost, and cohesion — were "contradicted by its own evidence." She wrote that the policy "reflects a bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group" and is "soaked with animus and dripping with pretext."
