In a world of disheartening news, let us enjoy Judge Ana Reyes’s epic scorching of Trump lawyers in court, in a hearing that will continue today!
ICYMI, Donald Trump banned trans people from serving in the military (again) with his “Prioritizing Military Excellence and Readiness” Executive Order, which followed his bonkers order about sexes producing large and small reproductive cells that actually proclaimed everybody is nonbinary, because his administration does not actually understand how biological sex works.
Then Defense Secretary Shitfaced, AKA Pete Hegseth, followed that up with a memorandum “pausing” all “medical procedures” associated with “facilitating a gender transition.”
So that got Bone Spurs and Secretary Shitfaced immediately sued by transgender people actively pursuing enlistment, and transgender service members — some of them much longer-serving and more qualified than Hegseth— who are represented by Jennifer Levi of GLAD Law and Shannon Minter from the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR), in a case called Talbott v. Trump. And the government’s case is being defended by DOJ attorney Jason Lynch, who also happened to be on the team prosecuting Hunter Biden. Here’s a picture of him from LinkedIn, so you can better picture him being humiliated in the story to come.
So now to court, where the case just happened to get the first openly gay DC federal judge. And would you believe that the DOJ struggled mightily and failed miserably to come up with any defense whatsoever?
The following is compiled from transcriptions by Michael Paulauski, Kyle Cheney and The Independent, to the best of our wonkability. Grab a bag of Cheez Balls for this one, it’s real good!
First, Judge Reyes got both sides to agree that it's reasonable for the US military to prioritize lethality and readiness and that the White House is owed deference to oversee the military. Sure! And she got DOJ lawyer Jason Lynch to agree that the plaintiffs served honorably, truthfully and with discipline, and made America safer, and that they had already all been determined to be mentally and physically fit to serve by the military, gender dysphoria and all.
Queried the judge: “If you were in a foxhole, you wouldn’t care about these individuals’ ‘gender ideology,’ right?” Lynch agreed. And would Lynch pick one of the plaintiffs in that circumstance over someone with less experience? Why, you betcha!
And it was all downhill from there for Lynch. He tried to argue that Trump’s executive order on military service by transgender people does not bar all transgender people serving in the military, which was reportedly baffling to the judge, and anyone else with eyeballs who read the order. What other conclusion could anybody come to from the sentence “expressing a false ‘gender identity’ divergent from an individual’s sex cannot satisfy the rigorous standards necessary for military service”? Or the part where it accuses trans service members of being mentally ill and unable to adhere to an honor code that requires a “commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life”? (Hoo boy, is that rich coming from Hegseth! And Trump!)
Then the judge zeroed right in on the bullshit about pronouns: “The Secretary shall promptly issue directives for DoD to end invented and identification-based pronoun usage to best achieve the policy outlined in section 2 of this order,” and the order’s whinings that President Joe Biden’s policy was “inconsistent with shifting pronoun usage or use of pronouns that inaccurately reflect an individual’s sex.”
JUDGE REYES: Can we agree that the greatest fighting force .. is not going to be impacted in any way by less than one percent of the soldiers using a different pronoun than others might want to call them?”
DOJ ATTORNEY JASON LYNCH: I can’t agree with that here.
JUDGE REYES: Would you agree with me that if the military is negatively impacted in any kind of way that matters [from the use of pronouns], we all have a lot bigger problems than pronoun use? We have a military that is incompetent. Any common-sense rational human being knows that it doesn’t. It is pretext. It is frankly ridiculous. If you can get me an officer of the United States military who is willing to get on the stand and say that because of pronoun usage the US military is less prepared, I will be the first to give you a box of cigars.
Then she gave the DOJ 10 days to find somebody willing to say that, just for fun. And she remarked, “Every single pronoun in the history of mankind has been invented.” ZING!
Judge Reyes also helpfully pointed out that the EO’s description of how sex works was some malarkey.
This executive order is premised on an incorrect biological assessment. This executive order is premised on an assertion that’s not biologically correct. There are anywhere near 30 intersex examples. Anyone who doesn’t have XX or XY chromosomes is not just male or female, they’re intersex. If I’m intersex, where am I allowed to go?
FINALLY SOMEBODY IS ASKING THAT QUESTION! Why aren’t more people asking that question?
Lynch had no response to it.
And, what even IS gender ideology, anyway? “If you can’t articulate what ‘radical gender ideology’ means, how is the defense secretary going to know what it means?” She asked Lynch. “I’m really loath to speculate what the President had in mind when he signed this order,” was all he could muster.
“It’s not like I randomly picked you off the street,” said Reyes. “You’re the government’s representative here.” BURN.
Ooh, then it was time to talk animus.
JUDGE REYES: [The order] calls an entire category of people dishonest, dishonorable, undisciplined, immodest, who lack integrity, people who have taken an oath to defend this country, people who have been under fire, people who have received medals for taking fire for this country. I want to know from the government whether that language expresses ‘animus.’ Does that express animus?
LYNCH: Not in any constitutional sense.
JUDGE REYES: In a commonsense way. I want to know from the government whether that language expresses animus. This is a policy from the President of the United States affecting thousands of people. To call an entire group of people, lying dishonest people who are undisciplined, immodest and have no integrity. How is that anything other than showing animus?
LYNCH: I don't have an answer for you.
JUDGE REYES: The government is not willing to take a position [that] to categorically call a group of people selfish is demeaning? The answer is ‘yes it is,’ ‘no it isn’t,’ or ‘I can’t say.’” You do have an answer, you just don't want to give it. People can make solid arguments as to why some or even most transgender people shouldn't be in the military. We're dealing with unadulterated animus. We are dealing with the president of the United States dealing with a group of people serving their country, calling them liars.
Reyes then declared that she’d changed her courtroom orders to bar people who graduated from UVA law school from appearing before her because “they're all liars and lack integrity and are undisciplined and can't possibly meet the high rigors of benign a lawyer for the government.” And she made Jason Lynch, the DOJ lawyer who self-identifies as a Wahoo, sit his ass down like a puppy. Then called him back up and asked whether that was a display of animus. AMAZING.
Lynch getting broasted and unable to come up with any kind of answer reportedly went on for FIVE HOURS.
Crazy and stupid that we’re back here again! Trans people have been banned from the military three times, first by Dwight Eisenhower’s Executive Order 10450 during his lavender scare era, and again in Trump 1.0 in 2017, after President Barack Obama had lifted the ban in 2015. In 2019 the Supreme Court allowed the policy prohibiting “transgender persons who require or have undergone gender transition” from serving to go into place. Then Biden overturned that ban.
As it is right this minute, trans soldiers can stay, as long as female-identified soldiers sign a vow that says, “Yes, I am willing to live in male bays, utilize male latrines, and be partnered with a male battle buddy,” or “No, I am not willing to live in male bays, utilize male latrines, and be partnered with a male battle buddy,” or vice-versa. And if they answer “no,” they are kicked out. Sure sounds like a ban, no matter what Jason Lynch says.
Arguments will continue into today, and Lynch convinced Judge Reyes to hold off on ruling on the transgender service members’ request for a restraining order until after the DoD issues its new guidance on or before February 26 as to how military branches should implement Trump’s executive order. Reyes scheduled another hearing for February 28, and until then, Reyes said, the DoD should not discharge any servicemembers.
Also yesterday a federal judge granted a preliminary injunction barring the Bureau of Prisons from implementing aspects of a separate order that would require transgender women to be housed in men’s facilities. And last week, another federal judge in DC ordered federal agencies to restore webpages containing health data and guidance for doctors that had been taken down in accordance with an order directing government agencies to scrub terms related to “gender ideology” from public-facing websites and documents.
Ultimately this all will likely get to the Supreme Court, which will probably let Trump do whatever he wants. Samuel Alito — an enormous bigot — has been doing his own research! But until then, let us all bask in the warm glow of that scorching from a judge who knows bullshit when she sees it.
[Law Dork / Above the Law / WUSA9 / Talbott v. Trump ]
"𝑰’𝒎 𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒍𝒍𝒚 𝒍𝒐𝒂𝒕𝒉 𝒕𝒐 𝒔𝒑𝒆𝒄𝒖𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒆 𝒘𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝑷𝒓𝒆𝒔𝒊𝒅𝒆𝒏𝒕 𝒉𝒂𝒅 𝒊𝒏 𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒅 𝒘𝒉𝒆𝒏 𝒉𝒆 𝒔𝒊𝒈𝒏𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒐𝒓𝒅𝒆𝒓,” 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒂𝒍𝒍 𝒉𝒆 𝒄𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒎𝒖𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒓.
Hey, dumbass pretending to be a lawyer, why don't you ask the Abomination had in mind when he signed this dumbass order? Oh, and being dumb-asses do not let y'all off the hook for your evil and illegal activities that are destroying the country.
"...it was time to talk animus..."
Don't get me started...
Lynch thought that 𝘋𝘦𝘧𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘌𝘹𝘦𝘤𝘶𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘦 was an actual thing, because Brainless Felon is willing it to be. So he showed up in his underpants and received a 5 hour atomic wedgie...
This is a fine fine thing.