Trump Asks Supreme Court To Let Him Enforce Ban On Transgender Troops

President Donald Trump is asking the Supreme Court to allow the Pentagon to immediately enforce his plan to ban transgender people from the military, while lawsuits challenging the plan move forward.

Two federal judges have barred the administration from expelling any transgender troops, ruling that Trump’s policy change is likely unconstitutional because it was motivated by discrimination and was not justified by valid military needs. Only one of those rulings, issued by a judge in Tacoma, Washington, is currently in effect.

Solicitor General John Sauer filed an emergency appeal with the high court Thursday arguing that the Tacoma judge, U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle, overstepped his authority. His ruling “cannot be squared with the substantial deference” that courts should show toward the Department of Defense’s “professional military judgments” that transgender troops pose risks to military readiness, Sauer wrote.

“The Constitution does not authorize courts to second-guess the approach to gender transition adopted by the 2025 policy,” Sauer added.

In 2019, the Supreme Court split, 5-4, as it ruled that the first Trump administration could proceed with a narrower ban that sought to exclude transgender people from the military who had undergone gender transition and those unwilling to serve “in their biological sex.”

President Joe Biden reversed that ban and allowed most transgender people to serve openly in the military. But shortly after returning to office, Trump revoked Biden’s policy and issued an executive order reinstating an even stricter ban.

Justice Elena Kagan, who initially handles emergency appeals arising from Washington state, gave the individuals challenging the ban until May 1 to file a response to the administration’s appeal.

Settle is a George W. Bush appointee. The other judge who blocked Trump from implementing the ban, U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes of Washington, D.C., is a Biden appointee. Both judges said the Trump administration distorted data to justify the ban and ignored the recent history of transgender servicemembers meeting and exceeding military standards.

While both judges agreed that military leaders have significant latitude to set standards for troop readiness, lethality and cohesion, they emphasized that the Pentagon must still obey constitutional boundaries — and that the Trump policy had crossed them.

Only Settle’s ruling is currently in effect, however, because the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a temporary block of Reyes’ ruling while the appeals court weighs the issue further.

Sauer asked the Supreme Court to put Settle’s ruling on hold, which would allow the ban to take effect while litigation proceeds in the lower courts.

The request is the latest in a string of emergency matters the Trump administration has brought to the Supreme Court on an expedited basis. In recent weeks, the administration has sought emergency intervention from the high court on a number of signature Trump issues, including: two cases involving deportations to El Salvador; Trump’s bid to summarily fire board members of independent federal agencies; and Trump’s effort to lift nationwide injunctions that have blocked his executive order ending the guarantee of birthright citizenship.

Sauer’s submission in the transgender troops case also objects to the nationwide aspect of the injunction that Settle ordered. If the high court is inclined to leave any part of it in place, the Trump administration is arguing that it should be limited to the eight servicemembers who filed that suit.