• Despite President Trump's opposition, Pentagon says transgender troops will be able to enlist in military in 2018

  
  
  
  

  
  

  The Pentagon has just announced that it will be allowing transgender people to enlist in the military starting from January 1, 2018 despite President Donald Trump's opposition. 

   

  The new policy reflects growing legal pressure on the issue, and the difficult hurdles the federal government would have to cross to enforce Mr Trump's demand to ban transgender individuals from the military. Two federal courts already have ruled against the ban. Potential transgender recruits will have to overcome a lengthy and strict set of physical, medical and mental conditions that make it possible, though difficult, for them to join the armed services. 

   

  Major David Eastburn, a Pentagon spokesman, says the enlistment of transgender recruits will start next month and go on amid the legal battles. The Defense Department also is studying the issue.