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There have been several times during this presidency that I woke up, looked at my phone, and felt my heart just sink through the floor because the president is a needlessly, intentionally cruel person.
This was one of the days, back in 2017. https://www.cnn.com/2017/07/26/politics/trump-military-transgender/index.html
It">https://www.cnn.com/2017/07/2... just came out of nowhere. And while I’ve never been in the military, never will be... it’s usually a bad sign when governments start singling out groups to ban from things like their militaries.
It">https://www.cnn.com/2017/07/2... just came out of nowhere. And while I’ve never been in the military, never will be... it’s usually a bad sign when governments start singling out groups to ban from things like their militaries.
His rationale didn’t make sense. The cost was minimal, there hadn’t been problems since the ban was lifted during the Obama era, etc.
But the reason that hit me with such a sense of unease was that if you can convince people who go around talking about how much...
But the reason that hit me with such a sense of unease was that if you can convince people who go around talking about how much...
...the love “the troops,” and convince them that some of those troops should be kicked out with a new policy based solely on who they are, you can CERTAINLY convince the public to accept government-sanctioned discrimination against those who aren’t in the military.
It was a very “oh shit, he’s going to really start leaning into a series of policies aimed at hurting trans people.” And he did. Pretty consistently from there on out.
And then it later came out that he just did it on a whim. There was no legitimate need, he just wanted to make the bigots in the House Freedom Caucus happy (their name is very ironic. “Freedom”) and didn’t want to go to a meeting. https://www.washingtonblade.com/2018/09/06/woodward-book-depicts-trump-surprising-top-staff-with-trans-military-ban/">https://www.washingtonblade.com/2018/09/0...
And then there was the time I woke up to a story from NYT about how the administration was trying to figure out how to create a legal framework to argue in favor of being able to exclude trans people from civil rights protections. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/21/us/politics/transgender-trump-administration-sex-definition.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/2...
That story came out on @KaylaPekkala and my first anniversary, so that made for a not-so-celebratory day! The administration went on to use those arguments in court. https://time.com/5654844/title-vii-trump-transgender-department-of-justice-supreme-court/">https://time.com/5654844/t...
Thankfully, SCOTUS found that the administration’s argument was wrong.
That was before Barrett was put on the court, though, so I’m not sure how long that ruling will last before it’s whittled down to nothing. https://www.npr.org/2020/06/15/863498848/supreme-court-delivers-major-victory-to-lgbtq-employees">https://www.npr.org/2020/06/1...
That was before Barrett was put on the court, though, so I’m not sure how long that ruling will last before it’s whittled down to nothing. https://www.npr.org/2020/06/15/863498848/supreme-court-delivers-major-victory-to-lgbtq-employees">https://www.npr.org/2020/06/1...
Even with the SCOTUS ruling, the administration has basically said that it didn’t agree with it and made no intention to enforce it. Instead, she cited the dissent as being the correct view. That’s... not how it works. https://www.washingtonblade.com/2020/07/13/wh-press-secretary-dodges-on-trans-military-ban-insists-trump-is-pro-lgbtq/">https://www.washingtonblade.com/2020/07/1...
