A federal judge spent a lawyer from the Department of Justice on Wednesday morning on the legality of the prohibition of the transgender service of the Pentagon, which repeatedly suggests that the policy is based on a defective understanding of gender dysphoria.
The new Pentagon policy to separate members of the American Transgender Service of the Army faces its first legal evidence, since the United States District Judge, Ana Reyes, considers that the issuance of an order that blocks the policy of arising.
During the hearing on Wednesday, Judge Reyes said that the government “cited badly” and “Cherry” scientific studies to incorrectly affirm that transgender soldiers decrease the preparation and lethality of the military.
While Judge Reyes has not yet issued a formal ruling, she repeatedly suggested that politics is unfairly addressed to a class of people who do not like the Trump administration.
“The question in this case is whether the military under the rights of equal protection grant all Americans under the due process of the fifth amendment, if the military … can do that and point to a specific medical problem that affects a specific group that the administration disadvantages,” he said.
Judge Reyes also pressed the lawyer of the Jason Manion Department of Justice to identify any other similar medical problem that has caused a similar response from the Department of Defense.
“Identify me once in recent history in which the military has excluded a group of people for having a disqualifying problem, because I can’t think of one,” Judge Reyes asked.
The Logo of the Department of Defense is seen in the wall in the press room of the press in the Pentagon, on October 29, 2024, in Washington.
Kevin Wolf/AP
Manion replied that the military applied a similar policy for the soldiers who refused to take the COVID-19 vaccine, which caused an incredulous judge to ask anyone in the gallery to raise their hand if they had understood.
“Many people raise their hands, right?” Judge Reyes said. “All different types of people … so not only had the objective of getting rid of a group of people.”
The plaintiffs have argued that the policy of the Department of Defense, which was ended at the end of February and prohibits the majority of the members of the transgender service to serve with some exceptions, violates the right of the fifth amendment to equal protection and causes irreparable damage to denigrating transgender soldiers, interrupting the cohesion of the unit and weakening the military.
“This case is a proof of the central democratic principle that makes our country it is worth defending: that each person is of equal dignity and value and has the right to the same protection of the laws,” said the plaintiffs.
The lawyers of the Department of Justice have defended the policy by arguing that the Court should not intervene in military decision making, describing gender dysphoria as a condition that causes “clinically significant distress or deterioration in the social, occupational or other important areas of human functioning.”
“The DOD has been particularly cautious about the service by people with mental health conditions, given the unique mental and emotional stress of military service,” government lawyers argued.
During a hearing last month, Judge Reyes, a Biden designated one who was the first LGBT judge in the DC district court, said a deep skepticism with the government’s statement that the members of the transgender service decrease the lethality or preparation of the military, although she declined to intervene until the DOD finished its policy.
When the policy was formalized last month, she quickly ordered the government to clarify the key principles of her policy, including the identification of what “mental health restriction” that is not the gender dysphoria that conflicts with the military standards of “honesty, humility and integrity.”
He also raised doubts about government claims about the exceptions to politics, marking in the court file a recent publication of the social networks of the Department of Defense that “transgender troops are disqualified from the service without an exemption.”
The hearing occurs in the middle of an increasingly hostile relationship between Judge Reyes and the Department of Justice.
After Judge Reyes excorted a lawyer from the Department of Justice last month during an hearing in the case, the Department of Justice filed a complaint with a judge of appeals about what they alleged that it was the “hostile and atrocious misconduct of kings.”
The chief of cabinet of the attorney general Pam Bondi, Chad Mizelle, claimed that Reyes demonstrated a political bias, committed the dignity of the procedures and inappropriately questioned a lawyer from the Department of Justice about his religious beliefs.
“At least, this issue guarantees greater investigation to determine if these incidents represent a pattern of misconduct that requires more significant corrective measures,” Mizelle wrote.
