The Supreme Court on Tuesday sided with the Trump administration in lifting a lower court order that paused the Pentagon's transgender military ban from taking effect – allowing Trump's order and related policies to proceed, at least.
The high court ruling is a near-term victory for the White House, even as it did not address the underlying merits of the case or President Donald Trump's Jan. 27 executive order banning transgender service members from the U.S. military.
Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson would have denied the administration's appeal and kept the lower court injunction in place.
At issue in the suit, Shilling v. United States, is Trump's executive order banning transgender military members.
The executive order would require the Defense Department to update its guidance regarding "trans-identifying medical standards for military service" and to "rescind guidance inconsistent with military readiness."
The Trump administration has argued that further stalling the policy could pose a threat to U.S. military readines – concerns it outlined to Supreme Court in a filing late last month.
"Absent a stay, the district court’s universal injunction will remain in place for the duration of further review in the Ninth Circuit and in this Court – a period far too long for the military to be forced to maintain a policy that it has determined, in its professional judgment, to be contrary to military readiness and the Nation’s interests," U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer told the court, urging justices to grant the stay.
Trump officials have argued that the transgender military policy "furthers the government’s important interests in military readiness, unit cohesion, good order and discipline, and avoiding disproportionate costs."
The case was immediately challenged in federal court. Seven transgender military members brought suit against the administration in Seattle-based federal court, and in Washington, D.C., where U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes grilled lawyers for the Trump administration in a dizzying line of questioning that invoked shelters, Jesus, and Miss Pac-Man, among other things, before asking the government to push its planned implementation deadline. That decision was later overturned by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.
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05.23.2025