If you’ve been following President Donald Trump’s efforts to push transgender people out of the military, you know federal courts across the country have been busy. This week added a new wrinkle: in a case called Talbott v. United States, the D.C. Circuit agreed that Trump’s 2025 “Hegseth Policy” likely violates the Constitution for some transgender troops, but it still left the door firmly shut to new transgender recruits.
A Decade of Whiplash on Trans Service
Over the past decade, transgender military service has swung back and forth with each administration. Under Obama, the Pentagon opened the door to open service and, eventually, enlistment by transgender people. During Trump’s first term, that path narrowed dramatically with a ban and then a restrictive policy under then Secretary of Defense General James Mattis. President Biden reversed course in 2021, restoring open service under what became known as the Austin Policy. Then, in January 2025, Trump’s second term brought yet another reversal: Executive Order 14183 and the Hegseth Policy, which broadly bar people with a diagnosis or history of gender dysphoria — and even those showing “symptoms consistent” with it— from serving.
For a fuller walkthrough of this policy pendulum, see our blog from last year: “New Lawsuit Challenges Transgender Military Ban.”
The first big test of that new ban came almost immediately in Washington State, where a group of transgender service members led by Commander Emily Shilling, an openly transgender Navy officer, sued in federal court. In March 2025, a judge in the Western District of Washington temporarily blocked the ban nationwide, finding that the challengers were likely to succeed on their equal protection claims and that letting the policy take effect would cause serious, irreparable harm. A few weeks later, the legal momentum shifted: on an emergency request from the Trump administration, the Supreme Court lifted that injunction in May 2025. The Court did not decide whether the Ban is constitutional, but it did clear the way for the policy to go into effect while the Ninth Circuit considers the case.
For a closer look at that Washington lawsuit and the Supreme Court’s emergency order, see our blog from last year: “SCOTUS Clears Path for Trump’s Trans Military Ban.”
While that case, called Shilling v. United States, continues in the Ninth Circuit, another group of transgender service members and would‑be recruits has been pressing a parallel challenge in Washington, D.C.
The Fight in D.C.
The D.C. case, which started around the same time, is called Talbott v. United States. This group included both currently serving transgender service members and transgender individuals seeking to join the military.
In March 2025, the D.C. district court granted a preliminary injunction against the policy. The court found that the “Military Ban” was “soaked in animus and dripping with pretext” and concluded that the Hegseth Policy functioned as a de facto ban on transgender troops, even though it purported to regulate only gender dysphoria and related medical issues. It held that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed on their equal protection claim and applied at least intermediate scrutiny, relying in part on earlier Supreme Court reasoning about sex discrimination.
The federal government appealed, and on Monday, the D.C. Circuit issued its ruling.
Current Troops Protected …
A divided appellate panel largely agreed with the district court that, as to currently serving plaintiffs, the Hegseth Policy is likely unconstitutional, but it trimmed back the preliminary injunction. It provided protection only for the named plaintiffs who are already serving, not for all transgender troops or would‑be recruits.
The court said the policy likely fails equal protection even under a deferential standard because key features are irrational, overbroad, and infused with hostility toward transgender people. It pointed to three especially troubling elements: the blanket disqualification of anyone with any past gender dysphoria, however remote; the bar on waivers for anyone who has ever “attempted to transition,” which sweeps in purely social transition; and the requirement that affected service members be pushed through administrative separation, a process usually reserved for misconduct, instead of the normal medical disability system.
The judges also stressed that the government offered no evidence that transgender people or those with gender dysphoria lack honesty, humility, or integrity, even though the policy documents repeatedly suggest exactly that, and did not dispute that the plaintiffs collectively have around 130 years of honorable service and more than 80 commendations.
… But Recruits Still Blocked
However, the court reached a different conclusion regarding would‑be recruits. It vacated the injunction as to accession (new enlistments), reasoning that the equities are not the same for prospective service members as for those whose ongoing careers are threatened. In the court’s view, delaying entry into the military is a harm that can be remedied later if the plaintiffs ultimately prevail, while forcing the military to admit new personnel under a policy the government may later successfully defend creates its own risks.
The panel was also concerned about reverting, even temporarily, to a more permissive accession standard that required only 18 months of stability after a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, compared to earlier policies’ 36‑month stability requirement for analogous mental health conditions. It treated that as a factor weighing against compelling the military to admit new recruits under the old standard at the preliminary‑injunction stage.
Finally, the D.C. Circuit narrowed the scope of the injunction itself. Relying on recent Supreme Court guidance disfavoring universal injunctions, it held that the district court’s order could not extend relief to everyone affected by the policy. Instead, it confined the injunction to the named plaintiffs who are currently serving.
A Likely Return to SCOTUS
When viewed alongside the Washington State litigation, Talbott illustrates how the same 2025 Trump–Hegseth policy has produced different interim outcomes in different courts. In the Shilling case, the Supreme Court allowed the policy to go into effect nationwide while the Ninth Circuit considers the merits. In Talbott, the D.C. Circuit preserved preliminary relief for a narrow group of current service members but left the ban fully in place for prospective recruits and for transgender troops who are not plaintiffs in that case.
The D.C. Circuit’s analysis also underscores a deeper question that will likely return to the Supreme Court: whether the 2025 policy will be treated as a neutral medical‑conditions rule or as a sex‑based, anti‑trans classification driven at least in part by animus. The answer to that question will determine what level of scrutiny applies and, in turn, whether policies like the Hegseth framework can stand.
