Appeals Court Blocks Trump’s Transgender Military Ban, Says Hegseth Policy Is ‘Arbitrary and Based in Animus’

AP Photo/Alex Brandon

A federal appeals court panel partially blocked a ban on transgender people currently serving in the military Monday, finding that an executive order signed by President Donald Trump and a policy enacted by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth had violated the plaintiffs’ “constitutional right to equal protection of the law” because it was “arbitrary and based in animus.”

The 107-page opinion was written by Judge Robert L. Wilkins of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, an Obama appointee. Previously, U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes had issued an injunction blocking the transgender military ban from going into effect in March 2025, writing that the language of the policy was “unabashedly demeaning” and that “its policy stigmatizes transgender persons as inherently unfit, and its conclusions bear no relation to fact.” However, in May 2025, the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to move forward with the ban while it was being challenged in court.

The case originally stems from the Executive Order Trump signed on January 27, 2025, just a few days into his second term, which declared that persons “expressing a false ‘gender identity’ divergent from an individual’s sex cannot satisfy the rigorous standards necessary for military service.” The Pentagon policy enacted by Hegseth (the “Hegseth Policy” in the opinion) stated that people with “gender dysphoria are unfit for military service because, among other things, the character of such persons (in the President’s and Secretary’s words) is ‘inconsistent’ with the ‘high standards . . . [of] honesty, humility, . . . and integrity.'”

The ruling was split 2-1 on two separate issues, regarding those currently serving in the military and those who wished to enlist.  Senior U.S. Circuit Judge Judith W. Rogers, a Clinton appointee, joined with Wilkins to affirm the injunction against enforcing the ban against plaintiffs who were current military members, and Judge Justin R. Walker, a Trump appointee, joined with Wilkins to vacate the injunction regarding those not yet enlisted.

The court further limited the application of the ruling to the plaintiffs, and not all current servicemembers who were facing exclusion due to the Hegseth Policy.

Wilkins’ opinion emphasized that the Trump administration “has not attempted to defend or provide any factual basis for these disparaging characterizations of American citizens” and “has not contested that the Plaintiff-Appellees who are currently serving (and who have collectively earned more than 80 commendations) have served honorably and pose no threat to national security, even though they happen to be transgender and have suffered from gender dysphoria.”

The government’s argument, Wilkins wrote, was “solely about whether, pursuant to the Hegseth Policy, the military can disqualify persons from military service because they have gender dysphoria, a mental health condition.”

However, Wilkins continued, the record of this case showed that the Hegseth Policy “goes far beyond disqualifying persons currently or recently suffering from gender dysphoria,” includes reasons for disqualification that “are completely unexplained and have no reasonable justification,” and “appears to be driven by the bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group: persons who identify as transgender.”

Therefore, Wilkins concluded, “the Hegseth Policy is both arbitrary and based upon animus, and for those reasons the Policy violates Plaintiff-Appellees’ constitutional right to equal protection of the law.”

Regarding the two groups of plaintiffs, the judge wrote, “the equities are much stronger in favor of the current servicemembers,” as compared to those wanting to enlist,” and this first group was less likely have a favorable ruling overturned on appeal.

The opinion went on to criticize the Trump administration’s ban on anyone who had ever expressed gender dysphoria as overly broad, since “the Hegseth Policy disqualified all persons with any history of gender dysphoria, regardless of how long ago the person had been stable and symptom-free — even if they were diagnosed as a child.”

The Hegseth Policy also did not allow any sort of case-by-case review or waiver, unless the service member “can demonstrate that they have never ‘attempted to transition,’ which appears to exclude anyone who has ever tried to socially transition in their lifetime (such as a biological woman wearing slacks and a tie),” wrote Wilkins.

Read the opinion here.

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