Divided appeals court rules Trump administration’s ban on transgender military service is unconstitutional

Washington — A divided federal appeals court ruled Monday that the Trump administration’s policy banning transgender individuals from serving in the military is likely unconstitutional.

A panel of three judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit split 2-1 in finding that the ban rolled out by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth last year was driven by animus toward transgender people.

Judges Judith Rogers and Robert Wilkins agreed that the Trump administration’s policy targeting transgender service members likely violated the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection.

The two judges agreed to leave in place a preliminary injunction that prevented the Defense Department from removing transgender troops who are in the military. That order is narrow and only covers the active-duty plaintiffs in the case.

“The government’s stated reason for issuing the Hegseth Policy as based solely upon gender dysphoria was pretextual, and that instead, the Hegseth Policy was premised, at least in part, on a non-legitimate state interest to harm the politically unpopular group of transgender persons,” Wilkins wrote in an opinion, adding that President Trump “declared transgender people as categorically unfit for military service explicitly because of their gender identity.”

Wilkins and Judge Justin Walker, meanwhile, allowed the administration to enforce restrictions on transgender plaintiffs who sought to join the military but were prevented under the new policy from doing so.

Walker, who authored a dissenting opinion, was nominated to the federal bench by Mr. Trump in 2020. Wilkins was appointed to the D.C. Circuit by President Barack Obama, and Rogers was tapped for the appeals court by President Bill Clinton.

Mr. Trump signed an executive order in the opening days of his second term that targeted active-duty and prospective service members with gender dysphoria. The president’s directive said that the military’s “high standards for troop readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity and integrity” are inconsistent with the “medical, surgical and mental health constraints on individuals with gender dysphoria.”

Soon after the president signed his executive order, Hegseth directed the Pentagon to pause new accessions for people with a history of gender dysphoria and halt medical procedures for transgender troops. The Defense Department issued a policy in February 2025 disqualifying people with gender dysphoria from military service unless they obtained a waiver. 

Hegseth’s policy drew several legal challenges, including in Washington, D.C., and Tacoma, Washington. In May 2025, in response to proceedings in the case from Tacoma, the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to continue enforcing its policy on transgender military service while litigation moved forward.

The D.C. lawsuit was brought by more than a dozen transgender active-duty service members and a group of transgender individuals who were actively pursuing enlistment. They argued that the Defense Department’s policy unlawfully discriminated against them based on their sex and transgender status.

In March 2025, U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes granted the plaintiffs’ request to block enforcement of the policy and issued a blistering decision finding, in part, that the Trump administration’s policy was driven by unconstitutional animus.

The Trump administration appealed and asked the D.C. Circuit to pause Reyes’ decision and allow it to enforce the transgender military ban. A different three-judge panel agreed to do so while the appeals court considered the legal merits.

In his opinion Monday, Wilkins wrote that Hegseth’s policy “does not classify whether persons are eligible to serve in the military in a reasonable and evenhanded manner,” since it disqualifies from service any person who has been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, regardless of when they were diagnosed or if they currently suffer from it.

He noted that the plaintiffs in the case have served a combined 130 years in the military and have collectively earned more than 80 commendations. He said the Trump administration did not contest that they have served honorably and satisfied military standards.

“This is not a case where we are left to speculate why the government drafted such broad, undifferentiated classifications,” Wilkins said. “Unless we are going to fall for the old Groucho Marx line — ‘who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?’ — we have direct evidence in this case that animus motivated the classifications in the Hegseth Policy.”

The judge wrote that the Trump administration “conceded” that there was “no evidence to establish that persons with gender dysphoria are not honest, humble, and full of integrity.”

An estimated 4,200 troops had been diagnosed with gender dysphoria as of December 2024, according to a defense official. Roughly 1,900 active-duty members of the military received gender-affirming care from the Defense Department between January 2016 and May 2021, according to a January 2025 report from the Congressional Research Service.