{"id":83588,"date":"2017-08-09T09:34:02","date_gmt":"2017-08-09T13:34:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=83588"},"modified":"2017-08-08T20:39:49","modified_gmt":"2017-08-09T00:39:49","slug":"gillibrand-leads-bipartisan-letter-with-44-senators-urging-mattis-to-not-implement-trans-ban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=83588","title":{"rendered":"Gillibrand leads bipartisan letter with 44 senators urging Mattis to not implement trans ban"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Kirsten Gillibrand<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Transgender service members have been serving openly since the policy was changed in June 2016; no military branch has reported any issues associated with their service<\/em><\/p>\n

U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand today\u00a0led a bipartisan letter<\/a>\u00a0signed by 44 additional Senators to Secretary James N. Mattis urging him to advise the President against implementing the announcement he made via Twitter Wednesday that transgender Americans can no longer serve in the military.<\/p>\n

This announcement contradicts existing Defense Department policies, undermines our military readiness, and puts our transgender service members as well as their commanders in an impossible situation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe appreciate General Dunford\u2019s message that no policy changes should be made until implementation guidelines have been issued,\u201d\u00a0the Senators wrote in the letter.\u00a0\u201cWe further write to request that, at a minimum, you do not separate any service member due to the person\u2019s gender identity until you have completed the assessment that you announced on June 30, have reported back to Congress about any challenges that you foresee in the accession and retention of transgender troops, and determined the Department is unable to mitigate these challenges.\u201d<\/p>\n

Senator Gillibrand was joined by Senators Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Michael F. Bennet (D-CO), Richard Blumenthal (D- CT), Cory A. Booker (D-NJ), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Ben Cardin (D-MD), Tom Carper (D-DE), Robert P. Casey, Jr. (D-PA), Susan M. Collins (R-ME), Christopher A. Coons (D-DE), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), Joe Donnelly (D-IN), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Richard Durbin (D-IL), Dianne Feinstein (D- CA), Al Franken (D-MN),\u00a0 Kamala D. Harris (D-CA), Margaret Wood Hassan (D-NH), Martin T. Heinrich (D-NM), Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND), Mazie K. Hirono (D-HI), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Edward J. Markey (D- MA), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Jeffrey A. Merkley (D-OR), Christopher S. Murphy (D-CT), Patty Murray (D-WA), Gary C. Peters (D-MI), Jack Reed (D-RI), Bernard Sanders (I- VT), Brian Schatz (D-HI), Charles E. Schumer (D-NY), Jeanne Shaheen (D- NH), Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), Jon Tester (D-MT), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Mark R. Warner (D-VA), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), and Ron Wyden (D-OR).<\/p>\n

The full text of the Senators\u2019 joint letter is included\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Transgender service members have been serving openly since the policy was changed in June 2016; no military branch has reported any issues associated with their service U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand today\u00a0led a bipartisan letter\u00a0signed by 44 additional Senators to Secretary James N. Mattis urging him to advise the President against implementing the announcement he made […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33903,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23810,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-83588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wellbeing","category-top-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=83588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/33903"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=83588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=83588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=83588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}