Sonoma County congressmen slam Trump’s military transgender ban

Sonoma County’s Democratic congressmen voiced strong condemnation Wednesday of President Donald Trump’s surprise announcement that he would bar transgender people from serving in the U.S. military.

Rep. Mike Thompson and Rep. Jared Huffman both said they were opposed to the new policy, announced by Trump in Wednesday morning Twitter posts, where he said the government would not “accept or allow” transgender people to perform military service “in any capacity.”

Thompson, D-St. Helena, said he believed Trump’s decision was “not what he claims it to be” - policy pivot for the military - characterizing it instead as a distraction from the administration’s “inability to get anything done.”

Thompson, an Army veteran, co-chairman of the Military Veterans Caucus and a member of the Congressional Army Caucus, said he thought the White House was trying to divert?attention away from the ongoing scandal over Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election, a “couple of false starts” from conservative lawmakers on health care reform and Trump’s public disparaging of his own attorney general, Jeff Sessions.

“I can tell you, as a combat veteran, the only thing I cared about the person serving next to me was that they could perform their duty and they loved America,” Thompson said. “There’s transgender people in our military who have conducted themselves bravely, with integrity, with patriotism. To say that they can’t serve is an embarrassment.”

Huffman, D-San Rafael, struck a similar tone, writing in a Facebook post that one of the key civil rights moments during former President Barack Obama’s tenure was “the promise that military service would be open to all patriotic Americans who wish to serve their country, including those who are transgender.”

Huffman noted Trump’s tweets came on the anniversary of President Harry Truman’s executive order to desegregate the military.

“This is not about budgets or social experiments, it’s about Americans who want to serve their country and being blocked by President Trump - who is, meanwhile, cheering billions of dollars in unneeded Pentagon spending and pushing a health care bill that would take health care from hundreds of thousands of veterans,” Huffman said.

Estimates on the number of transgender people serving in the military have varied, but one figure in a RAND Corp. study last year said about 2,450 of about 1.3 million active-duty military members could be transgender. Another estimate from the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law put the number of transgender service members, including Guard or Reserve forces, at about 15,500.

Even before Trump’s announcement this week, transgender people were not yet able to join the military as new recruits because Defense Secretary Jim Mattis had delayed implementation of the Obama administration’s policy.

First Sgt. Eric Wroblewski of the North Bay Army Recruiting Co. said he did not have figures on how many people within his recruiting area have been turned away on the basis of their gender identity, but he estimated it was “not a significant number.” He could not recall any transgender people who had been turned away over the past year.

Nonetheless, the move from Trump has caused alarm and concern among North Coast progressive activists.

“This is another move that’s pandering to Trump’s base, and it’s a policy that’s going to take away rights and liberties and employment to hundreds, if not thousands, of transgender people,” said Karen D’Or, founder of the group Indivisible Sonoma County, which seeks to resist Trump’s agenda. “We are completely in solidarity with the LGBT community in Sonoma County ... and we will support the community in whatever way possible.”

You can reach Staff Writer J.D. Morris at 707-521-5337 or jd.morris@pressdemocrat.com.