When the President said he wanted to makeover the military, lifting the ban on transgenders isn’t what most people had in mind. With less than 18 months left in his mission of “fundamentally transforming America” President Obama is accelerating the effort to repeal the ban stopping men and women suffering from gender confusion from serving in the military. In an announcement Monday, Secretary Ash Carter said, “The Defense Department’s regulations regarding transgender service members are outdated and are causing uncertainty that distracts commanders from our core missions.” No, what distracts commanders from their core missions are ridiculous social experiments like this one. As part of the statement, Carter launched a six-month study on the impact of repealing the ban — which, if it’s anything like “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’s,” will have no bearing whatsoever on the final decision-making. And, after five years of that experiment, support for the repeal isn’t exactly growing. Just a third (32%) of voters now think open homosexuality is a good thing for the military — an all-time low, Rasmussen found. While LGBT activists cheer, others can only shake their heads in astonishment. “Considering the abysmal condition of our military and a decline in readiness, why is this a top priority for the Obama administration?” our own Lt. Gen. Jerry Boykin asked. If the President were as focused on the world’s threats like he was focused on LGBT activism, America would be the safest, most powerful country in the world. Instead, the White House is so busy using the troops as carriers for his social engineering that our military can’t even confront the real enemy. It all confirms what former Defense Secretary Robert Gates wrote in his book — that the only time he sensed passion from the President about any issue involving the military was overturning “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Meanwhile, U.S. veterans (if they aren’t on waiting lists for health care) watch helplessly as the blood they poured out to help stabilize the Middle East is lost, while this administration pushes an agenda to persuade Americans that the country’s current policy is “discriminatory.” But the reality is, the military discriminates constantly in its attempts to find the best physical and mental recruits it can. Why is this any different? Otherwise qualified men and women are turned away from the military every day for bad eyes, flat feet, asthma, and a host of other truly immutable characteristics. Yet in the phony name of fairness, our leaders would willingly let people into the military whose mental state is not only unstable — but a detriment to their fellow service members? It’s illogical. Allergies can keep you out of the military, but gender dysphoria can’t? The tension with China and Iran is escalating, and America’s strength is declining. Instead of Humvees, we’re buying hormones. A military whose budget was cut to bare bones will suddenly be forking over millions of dollars for surgeries, therapies, pills, and retrofitting of facilities. And for what? Certainly not to make the military more capable of performing its mission. It is time for our nation’s military leaders to put their stars on the line and tell the President “no.” The thousands of men and women who serve in our military follow the orders flowing from the Pentagon, trusting that their leaders are doing what is necessary to accomplish the military’s mission — not the deviant agenda of this President. To understand the disruption this repeal could cause, get the facts on transgenderism. Check out FRC’s new paper, “Responding to the Transgender Movement.”
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