The Trump administration wants the Supreme Court to let it enforce a ban on transgender people serving in the military, after a federal trial judge preliminarily blocked the ban nationwide pending further litigation.
Last month, U.S. District Judge Benjamin Settle said transgender service members who sued over the ban raised “serious questions going to their Equal Protection, Due Process, and First Amendment rights.” The George W. Bush appointee sitting in Washington state also said that “the balance of hardships tips sharply towards plaintiffs, who suffer not only loss of employment, income, and reputation, but also a career dedicated to military service.”
On Thursday, the administration again turned to the high court, as it has done several times over the past few months after losing lower court litigation.
The Supreme Court has so far agreed with the administration in some but not all cases.
“In this case, the district court issued a universal injunction usurping the Executive Branch’s authority to determine who may serve in the Nation’s armed forces,” U.S. Solicitor General John Sauer wrote, sounding a familiar theme of judges unduly meddling with executive power. The Supreme Court has so far agreed with the administration in some but not all cases.
Sauer said that if Settle’s nationwide halt isn’t paused while the government appeals, that would be “a period far too long for the military to be forced to maintain a policy that it has determined, in its professional judgment, to be contrary to military readiness and the Nation’s interests.” He asked the justices to at least limit the injunction to the individual plaintiffs while litigation continues.
An appellate panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit declined last week to halt Settle’s ruling, and Sauer’s Supreme Court application followed. It went to Justice Elena Kagan, who handles emergency litigation from the 9th Circuit (the justices handle different circuits). She told the plaintiffs to file a written response by next Thursday, May 1, at 5 p.m. ET, after which the government can file a final reply brief and Kagan can refer the matter to the full court for consideration. But the ban is still blocked for now.
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