Judge says Trump cannot implement transgender military policy

The Hill ^ | 3/19/19 | Rebecca Kheel

[Revel]

A federal judge on Wednesday affirmed her injunction preventing President Trump’s transgender military policy from taking effect remains in place days after the Pentagon released a memo to implement the policy.

In a three-page order, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia wrote that “defendants were incorrect in claiming that there was no longer an impediment to the military’s implementation of the [transgender policy] in this case.”

Asked whether the order will affect plans to implement the policy April 12, a Pentagon spokeswoman said the department is “consulting with the Department of Justice on next steps.”

The spokeswoman referred further comment to the Justice Department, which declined to comment.

Last week, acting Deputy Defense Secretary David Norquist signed a memo implementing a policy that would ban most transgender people from serving in the military. The memo makes the policy effective April 12.

The memo came roughly a week after a federal court ruled to lift the last of the injunctions preventing Trump’s policy from taking effect.

A federal judge in Maryland ruled he had no choice but to the lift the injunction after the Supreme Court in February ruled 5-4 to lift two other injunction.

But advocates for transgender troops and the Trump administration continued to fight over whether a fourth injunction remained in place despite the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia’s ruling to lift it.

The plaintiffs in that lawsuit argued the injunction still holds until they decide whether they want a rehearing in front of the appeal court’s full bench. The deadline for them to decide is March 29.

In Tuesday’s court order, Kollar-Kotelly agreed, saying the D.C. Circuit Court’s judgment is not final until it issues a mandate after the deadline passes

[blueplum]

ignore any judge that tries to legislate from the bench.

[savedbygrace]

I might not be 100% correct, but I think the USSC took two of the cases in which lower courts had enjoined the Trump administration to stop restricting transgendered people from joining the military. In those two cases, the USSC agreed to stop the injunctions.

But there have been four cases that were brought, and so there are still two others that need USSC action.

So, the Supreme HAS ruled, but not on the entire thing. They only ruled that the first two injunctions.

[JimRed]

When did this judge become Commander-in-Chief?