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Supreme Court allows transgender troop ban while lawsuits proceed

The ruling was made over objections from the court‘s liberal justices

Supreme Court and the America flag (CQ Roll Call file photo).
Supreme Court and the America flag (CQ Roll Call file photo).

The Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed the Trump administration to implement its ban on transgender troops, over the objections of the four liberal justices.

Nationwide injunctions from lower courts had stopped the ban for nearly a year. But the court Tuesday allowed a ban of transgender individuals from serving in the U.S. military to go into effect while lawsuits move through the courts. 

In the unsigned order, Justices Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan dissented. 

The court’s decision received swift condemnation from Democrats, including Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who panned the ruling and President Donald Trump’s 2017 decision to exclude transgender people from military ranks in the first place.

“Discrimination has no place in our military or society. It is my hope that this temporary ruling will not be the final outcome,” Sanders said on Twitter. “We must stand with trans service members. Trump’s efforts to divide us will not succeed.”

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