If peer review boards decide that the individuals can continue to serve, commanders can overturn that decision, according to a memo seen by AP. This violates the established policy that the boards should be independent.
Under the new policy, transgender people will also be required to appear before the boards in uniforms that match the gender they were assigned at birth, and if they fail to do so, their absence can be used against them.
Pentagon deputy press secretary Riley Podleski said in a comment to the AP that the department "as a matter of principle does not comment on ongoing litigation."
The Trump administration has taken several steps to restrict the rights of transgender people since taking office in January. In May, the US Supreme Court lifted a ban on a presidential order banning transgender people from serving in the US military, an order Trump signed on the first day of his second term.
