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Court deals second blow to Trump’s transgender military ban

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A federal judge has blocked enforcement of President Trump’s transgender military ban. (Photo public domain)

A federal judge in Maryland has issued a ruling against President Trump’s ban on transgender people serving in the U.S. military, the second court decision against the policy.

In a 53-page decision, U.S. District Judge Marvin Garbis, an appointee of George H.W. Bush, determined a preliminary injunction against the ban is warranted because it violates the right to equal protection under the law.

“There is no doubt that the directives in the presidentā€™s memorandum set apart transgender service members to be treatedĀ differently from all other military service members,”Ā Garbis writes. “Defendants argue that deference is owed to military personnel decisions and to the militaryā€™s policymaking process. The court does not disagree. However, the court takes note of the amici of retired military officers and former national security officials, who state ‘this is not a case where deference is warranted, in light of the absence of any considered military policymaking process, and the sharp departure from decades of precedent on the approach of the U.S. military to major personnel policy changes.ā€

Garbis rendered the decision on the basis that the policy against transgender people should be viewed in the courts with heightened scrutiny, but also determined the military ban would fail under the less rigorous review of the rational basis standard.

The decision is the second ruling against Trump’s transgender military ban. Last month, a federal court in D.C. blocked Trump from enforcing the policy, although left standing a provision denying gender reassignment surgery for transgender service members.

That court decision also left in place a memo by Defense Secretary James Mattis delaying a change in policy until Jan. 1 that would have allowed openly transgender people to enlist in the armed forces.

But the Garbis ruling goes further, requiring the U.S. military to admit qualified transgender people and afford gender reassignment surgery to U.S. troops who need it as part of essential medical care.

Like the earlier court decision, Garbis cites Trump’s decision to announce the transgender military ban in July via Twitter as evidence it was driven by animus, and not a well thought-out military decision.

“A capricious, arbitrary, and unqualified tweet of new policy does not trump the methodical and systematic review by military stakeholders qualified to understand the ramifications of policy changes,”Ā Garbis writes.

The lawsuit ā€” one of four pending challenges to the transgender military ban ā€” was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Maryland and Covington & Burling LLP on behalf of six transgender service members fearing discharge under Trump’s policy.

The plaintiffs are Petty Officer First Class Brock Stone, Senior Airman John Doe, Airman First Class Seven Ero George, Petty Officer First Class Teagan Gilbert, Staff Sergeant Kate Cole, and Technical Sergeant Tommie Parker.

Joshua Block, senior staff attorney with the ACLUā€™s LGBT & HIV Project, said in a statement the decision “is a victory for transgender service members across the country.”

ā€œWeā€™re pleased that the courts have stepped in to ensure that trans service members are treated with the dignity and respect they deserve,” Block said.

Hogan Gidley, a White House spokesperson, said the Trump administration will continue to defend the transgender military ban in court.

“The president’s directive is legal and promotes our national security,” Gidley said. “The Department of Justice will vigorously defend it.”

Lauren Ehrsam, a Justice Department spokesperson, said the Trump administration disagrees with the decision by the court.

ā€œWe disagree with the court’s ruling and are currently evaluating the next steps,” Ehrsam said. “Plaintiffsā€™ lawsuit challenging military service requirements is premature for many reasons, including that the Defense Department is actively reviewing such service requirements, as the president ordered, and because none of the plaintiffs have established that they will be impacted by current policies on military service.”

Army Maj. Dave Eastburn, a Pentagon spokesperson, reiterated a study is in place within the Defense Department evaluating the issue of transgender military service.

ā€œFirst and foremost, the health and welfare of our service members is of the upmost importance, and one of our top priorities,” Eastburn said. “That said, current interim guidance laid forth by the secretary of defense clearly states that persons diagnosed with gender dysphoria, by a military medical professional, will continue to serve. The current policy is under review and a recommendation will be made on the conditions of that policy from the secretary to the White House sometime early next year.”

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Federal Government

House races could decide Department of Education’s future

Second Trump administration could target transgender students

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The Lyndon Baines Johnson Building, Washington D.C., headquarters of the U.S. Department of Education (Photo Credit: GSA/U.S. Dept. of Education)

The Associated Press reports that more than a dozen races for seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, including 10 for congressional districts in California, remain too close to call as of Tuesday ā€” a full week after voters cast their ballots on Nov. 5.

Democrats hope that if they can flip the lower chamber, which is now governed by a narrow Republican majority, it might function as a bulwark against President-elect Donald Trump, his incoming administration, and the 53-47 majority in the U.S. Senate that his party secured last week.

If, on the other hand, the GOP retains control of the House, the Republican victory would clear a major roadblock that could otherwise have stymied a major plank of Trump’s education agenda: Plans to permanently shutter the U.S. Department of Education.

Congress ultimately scuttled the former president’s effort to do so during his first administration ā€” though, technically, the proposal then was to merge the agency with the U.S. Department of Labor.

The Wall Street Journal notes that some Republicans, at the time and in the years since, have come out against plans to abolish the 44-year-old agency, in some cases even objecting to major funding cuts proposed by Trump that they understood were likely be unpopular.

However, if the second term plans for DOE as delineated in the Trump campaign’s Agenda47 and the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 governing blueprint become a major policy priority once the incoming administration takes over in January, reluctant Republican lawmakers will face tremendous pressure to get out of Trump’s way.

Federal government will remain in schools to advance anti-trans, anti-woke agenda

Among other responsibilities, DOE disburses and manages student loans, enforces the civil rights laws in public schools, and provides funding for students with disabilities. The agency’s programs, such as Title I, offer assistance for low-achieving or high-poverty K-12 schools, while Pell Grants help undergraduates who otherwise would not be able to pay for college.

It is unclear whether or how those functions will continue if the DOE is disbanded.

Trump’s aim, at least in large part, is to give states ā€” rather than the federal government ā€” the ultimate say over how their schools are run. At the same time, perhaps paradoxically, the other cornerstone of his education policy agenda is to issue proscriptive rules governing the content, curricula, and classroom discussion that will be permitted in the country’s public schools.

Specifically, this means “critical race theory, gender ideology or other inappropriate racial, sexual or political” topics or materials are forbidden. Reasonable people are likely to disagree about what is and is not “inappropriate,” and they may well have different, even disparate, definitions for terms like “gender ideology.”

When Florida and other states enacted similar anti-LGBTQ content and curricular restrictions in their public schools, critics warned the ambiguous language in the statute and the resulting confusion would lead to censorship, or perhaps self-censorship, especially for students and staff who, by virtue of their skin color or sexual orientation or gender identity, are more likely to be targeted with targeted or overzealous enforcement in the first place.

DOE plays major role investigating alleged civil rights violations in schools

According to the National Education Association, “federal civil rights laws prohibit school boards and other employers from discriminating against or harassing staff or students based on their sexual orientation or gender identity,” which “means, for example, that a school district may not prohibit only LGBTQ+ educators from answering studentsā€™ questions about their families, may not prohibit recognition and discussion in class only of LGBTQ+ families, and may not require that only LGBTQ+ students hide their sexual orientation or gender identity at school.”

However, the NEA warns, “some school districts, administrators, and the Florida Department of Education may nonetheless choose to do so until a court orders otherwise.”

If officials at a public high school allow heterosexual teachers to display family photos in their classrooms but warn the openly gay teacher that he must put his away or be terminated for violating restrictions on in-school discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity, the manner in which the policy was enforced against him would presumably run afoul of the federal civil rights laws, which prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

The teacher could assume the expense of hiring an attorney to pursue legal remedies, shouldering the burden and the risk that litigation that could drag on for months and conclude with a judgment in favor of his employer. Alternatively, until or unless Trump dissolves the agency, he could file a complaint with DOE’s Office of Civil Rights.

Alternatively, until or unless Trump dissolves the agency, the teacher could file a complaint with DOE. The agency’s Office of Civil Rights would evaluate the information he shared to determine whether there were sufficient grounds to open an investigation and, if so, would deploy “a variety of fact-finding techniques” that can include a review of documentary evidence submitted by both parties, interviews with key witnesses, and site visits.

After the investigation is complete, if a “preponderance of the evidence supports a conclusion that the recipient failed to comply with the law,” OCR will attempt to negotiate a resolution agreement. If the recipient refuses to resolve the matter in this manner, OCR can “suspend, terminate, or refuse to grant or continue federal financial assistance to the recipient, or may refer the case to the Department of Justice.”

According to the DOE’s website, the agency has 11,782 investigations that were open as of Tuesday, with complaints against institutions of all kinds operating in all 50 states, from rural elementary schools in the Deep South to prestigious medical schools, community colleges, and charter schools for students with developmental disabilities. Likewise, the six civil rights laws over which OCR has jurisdiction cover a wide range of conduct, from sexual harassment to discrimination, retaliation, and single-sex athletics scholarships.

Should Trump succeed in abolishing the department, it is not yet clear how those active investigations will be handled, nor how complaints about violations of civil rights law by educational institutions would be reported and investigated moving forward in the agency’s absence.

During his first administration, Trump passed proposed changes to Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which retooled the process for reporting sexual assault on college campuses in ways that were widely seen as imbalanced in favor of the accused.

President Joe Biden in April issued new guidelines that featured “significant shifts in how institutions address sexual harassment, and assault allegations while expanding protections for LGBTQ+ and pregnant students,” the American Council on Education wrote. Specifically, the administration provided a “new definition of sexual harassment, extending jurisdiction to off-campus, and international incidents,” while “clarifying protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, pregnancy, and parenting status.”

The regulations sidestepped thornier questions, however, about how schools should approach issues at the intersection of gender identity and competitive sports, specifying only that they should avoid bans that would categorically prohibit transgender athletes from participating.

Shortly after the Biden administration’s guidelines were introduced, Trump vowed they would be “terminated” on his first day in office. He also pledged to enact anti-trans policies that appear to have been modeled after some of the most extreme of the roughly 1,600 anti-trans bills that conservative statehouses have proposed from 2021-2024.

Among other promises Trump made during the campaign were plans to enact a nationwide ban on trans student athletes competing in accordance with their gender identity, a federal law that would recognize only two genders, and the prosecution of health care providers who administer gender affirming care to patients younger than 18.

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National

Trump refers to Anderson Cooper as ā€˜Allisonā€™

Crude insults continue in effort to attract male voters

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Donald Trump is referring to CNNā€™s Anderson Cooper as ā€˜Allison.ā€™

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump referred repeatedly over the weekend to CNNā€™s Anderson Cooper as ā€œAllison Cooper.ā€

Cooper, one of the nationā€™s most prominent openly gay television anchors, moderated a town hall last week with Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris.

Trump last Friday called Anderson ā€œAllisonā€ in a social media post, then used the moniker again at a Michigan rally.

ā€œIf you watched her being interviewed by Allison Cooper the other night, heā€™s a nice person. You know Allison Cooper? CNN fake news,ā€ Trump said, before adding, ā€œOh, she said no, his name is Anderson. Oh, no.ā€

Trump repeated the name during another Michigan rally on Saturday, according to the Associated Pres, then followed it up during a reference in Pennsylvania. ā€œThey had a town hall,ā€ Trump said in Michigan. ā€œEven Allison Cooper was embarrassed by it. He was embarrassed by it.ā€

Describing Anderson Cooper as female plays into offensive and stereotypical depictions of gay men as effeminate as Trump continues to pursue the so-called ā€œbro vote,ā€ amping up crude and vulgar displays in an effort to appeal to male voters.

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Pennsylvania

Transgender Honduran woman canvasses for Harris in Pa.

Monserrath Aleman is CASA in Action volunteer

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Monserrath Aleman, a transgender woman in Honduras, has canvassed in Pennsylvania for Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democratic candidates. (Photo by Phil Laubner/CASA in Action)

A transgender woman from Honduras has traveled to Pennsylvania several times in recent weeks to campaign for Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democratic candidates.

Monserrath Aleman traveled to York on Aug. 31 and Lancaster on Sept. 21 with a group of other volunteers from CASA in Action. 

They door-knocked in areas where large numbers of African Americans, Black, and Latino voters live. Aleman and the other CASA in Action volunteers urged them to support Harris, U.S. Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.), and other down ballot Democratic candidates.

Aleman will be in Harrisburg on Nov. 2, and in York on Election Day.

“We achieved the goal that we had in mind and that we wanted to achieve,” she told the Washington Blade on Oct. 22 during a Zoom interview from Baltimore. “We knocked on doors, passed out flyers.”

Aleman cited Project 2025 ā€” which the Congressional Equality Caucus on Thursday sharply criticized ā€” when she spoke with the Blade.

“We know that there is a Project 2025 plan that would affect us: The entire immigrant Latino community, the LGBTI community, everyone,” said Aleman. “So that’s why I’m more motivated to go knocking on doors, to ask for help, for support from everyone who can vote, who can exercise their vote.”

She told the Blade that she and her fellow volunteers “did not have any bad response.”

Aleman grew up in Yoro, a city that is roughly 130 miles north of the Honduran capital of Tegucigalpa.

She left Honduras on Nov. 25, 2021.

Aleman entered Mexico in Palenque, a city in the country’s Chiapas state that is close to the border with Guatemala. The Mexican government granted her a humanitarian visa that allowed her to legally travel through the country.

Aleman told the Blade she walked and took buses to Ciudad JuƔrez, a Mexican border city that is across the Rio Grande from El Paso, Texas.

She scheduled her appointment with U.S. Customs and Border Protection while living at a shelter in Ciudad JuĆ”rez.Ā Aleman now lives in Baltimore.

“Discrimination against the LGBTI community exists everywhere, but in Honduras it is more critical,” said Aleman.

Aleman added she feels “more free to express herself, to speak with someone” in the U.S. She also said she remains optimistic that Harris will defeat former President Donald Trump on Election Day.

“There is no other option,” said Aleman.

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