Republican U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio is bringing forth a bill that in many cases would bar transgender people from serving in the military.
While the proposal outlines a few exceptions, it seeks to disqualify anyone who identifies as transgender and who seeks or has undertaken gender reassignment surgery. A transgender person without a history or diagnosis of gender dysphoria, Rubio’s draft says, can serve under their sex assigned at birth.
If passed and signed by President Joe Biden — an unlikely scenario — the law would also require the Secretary of Defense to limit the service member database to only collect sex assigned at birth and change any gender markers that “do not match a service member’s biological sex.”
A companion bill will be filed in the House by U.S. Rep. Jim Banks, R-IN, according to Rubio.
Issues surrounding gender identity have become increasingly political, with conservatives in Florida and across the U.S. pushing to restrict access to gender-affirming care and ban the teaching of sexuality and gender identity to younger public school students.
On Thursday, LGBT and civil rights organizations began to speak out against Rubio’s bill.
“Anyone who meets the military’s standards should be allowed to serve their country,” the Human Rights Campaign said on Twitter. “Marco Rubio and Jim Banks are trying to turn back the clock on transgender military service, but pandering to Donald Trump does nothing to strengthen our military.”
In 2016, the Obama administration allowed transgender people to openly serve in the military. The Trump administration placed restrictions on transgender service members in 2018. President Biden then reversed the policy and expanded eligibility for transgender people wishing to join the military, allowing service members to transition while in the armed forces.
Rubio penned a report in November about “wokeness” in the military, in which he claimed political ideology, critical race theory and “promoting LGBTQ and individuality” were weakening the institution. He also fired shots at the Biden administration for “punishing the righteous” and “protecting incompetent leaders.”
“Biden has turned our military into a woke social experiment,” Rubio said in a statement. “It is a stupid way to go about protecting our nation. We need to spend more time thinking about how to counter threats like China, Russia, and North Korea and less time thinking about pronouns.”
Rubio’s proposal is co-sponsored by Sen. Ted Budd, R-NC, Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-TN, Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-AL, and Sen. Mike Braun, R-IN.
“With global tensions currently on the rise, it is imperative that we return our focus to military readiness, not some woke ideology,” Budd said in a statement. “The U.S. military is no place to be experimenting with social engineering.”
Rubio’s proposal at a glance
Anyone who identifies as transgender, who has been diagnosed or has a history with gender dysphoria would be disqualified from serving unless:
▪ They have been “stable” in their biological sex for three years before joining
▪ They are already in the military, are “stable” in their biological sex and remain deployable, according to their biological sex’s standards
▪ They are already in the military, are qualified to serve on behalf of their biological sex and may receive medically necessary treatment except for transition procedures, which Rubio defines as transition surgery and hormone therapy
