Will they get picked out . Today, no answers to that question. Sarah Huckabee Sanders could not or would not answer questions about whether Current Service members will be removed. The president has a lot of support for all americans and certainly wants to protect all americans at all times. The president has expressed concerns since this obama policy came into effect. But hes also voiced that this is a very expensive and disruptive policy, and based on consultation that hes had with his National Security team, came to the conclusion that it erodes Military Readiness and Unit Cohesion, and made the decision based on that. The decision is based on a Military Decision. Its not meant to be anything more than that. At a white house event an attempt to get clarity from the president later went ignored. People in the military . Shes very rude. So all we have on this Policy Change that will profoundly affect thousands of Service Members lives are the president s three tweets, which mention the tremendous medical costs and disruption, having transgender Service Members in the military. What he means by disruption is really anybodys guess. But keeping them honest on the tremendous medical costs, last year a study commissioned by the Defense Department estimated those costs to be between 2. 4 and 8. 4 million a year. Again, the high estimate is 8. 4 million, and as the Washington Post points out, the military spends 41 million a year on viagra. As per sarah Huckabee Sanders insistence this was a Military Decision and nothing more, keeping them honest, if that is true, why were the heads of the four branches of the military caught off guard . Beyond that, theres a politics issue and perception issue that cant be ignored. Politico reports the sudden transgender ban was in part an
effort to save a house spending bill, a bill in jeopardy because of gop infighting over the issue of the government paying medical costs for transgender troops. And a political reporter quotes an official as saying the ban would force democrats in rust belt states to own the issue, defending transgender Service Members in the 2018 elections, which the white house believes would hurt those democrats. Either motivation amounts to uses transgender as political pawns. And its no coincidence the president did this when hes getting criticism from conservative supporters for bashing Jeff Sessions, essentially throwing red meat to conservatives. Lbg strvegs stat is starting
donald trump very much. You tell me, whos better for gays, tell me, whos better for the Gay Community and whos better for women than donald trump . Believe me. The lbgt community, the Gay Community, the lesbian community, they are so much in favor of what ive been saying over the last three or four days. As your president , i will do everything in my power to protect our lgbtq citizens. As you know, President Trump never served in the military. Some lawmakers who did have weighed in, including john mccain who said regardless of Gender Identity any american who wants to and is able to serve should be treated as the patriots they are. Earlier, i spoke with senator tammy duckworth, who was shot down in iraq and lost her legs and partial use of her right arm. Senator, cnn is reporting tonight that the Service Chiefs who represent the four branches of the military were caught off guard by the president s twitter announcement. This is very, very typical of this president who blunders forward in areas where he has no expertise. Ive said before, he is not fit to be commander in chief and his tweet shows that he has reinforced my opinion of him. When the white house says this was purely a Military Decision, having transgender people serve disrupts Military Readiness and Unit Cohesion, do you believe that . I do not believe that, anderson. Weve had transgender people who have served in Tens Of Thousands have served over the course of our militarys history. I dont know why the president is doing this. If anything, what hes doing is disruptive to Unit Cohesion. Is this about politics or just appealing to his base . I would think this is about appealing to his base, its not about Military Readiness. And the facts and figures he
quotes are blatantly wrong. He says its going to be too expensive when the Cost Estimate for the health care of transgender people is around in 2015, 2016, 5. 6 million. The pentagon spent 41 million on viagra in that same time period. So there are other places that you can cut if you want to talk about cost. White house has no answer to the question whats going to happen to transgender members currently serving. Does that make sense to you . I would think that would have been something that was figured out before announcing this. Well, isnt this typical of this administration, anderson . Frankly, they move forward, they have not found anything out. They just come one these harmful for our nation. Ually are and in this case, harmful for the greatest military on the face of the earth. Our military Men And Women who are willing to die to protect the values deserve far better than this type of policy, especially one thats not been
thought out. I want to play for our viewers something the president said just last night which was directed to veterans some remarks he made. You carried out your duty with honor, kournlgs acourage a devotion. And with your sacrifice, you earned our freedom. In my administration, we will always protect those who protect us, believe me. We will protect you, because you have protected us. Is there some irony in that . He said that yesterday. Is the president today protecting people who protected us . I think that his tweet today made a lie of what he said last night. You know, axios spoke to someone in the white house about this decision who said this forces democrats in rust belt states to take ownership of the issue, saying blue collar voters who might not look kindly in opposition to this move from the president , youre from a rust belt state. How do you respond to that . When im out in my home state of illinois, and i travel with
people or talking about the promises that he has not kept, and theyre not talking about this issue. Theyre talking about the fact that hes allowing the Dakota Access pipeline to be made with foreign steel, steel made in russia. Theyre talking about the fact that he spends 3 million a weekend to go to maralago at a time when we have counties in the southern part of my state that dont have enough Sheriff Deputies who are on duty. People are not talking about this issue. So to the thousands of transgender members serving now in the military, what can you say to them tonight . I will be fighting on their behalf. And what im going to say to them and to the American People is that when i was bleeding to death in my helicopter after that rpg ripped through cockpit of the aircraft, and an american came to save my life, it didnt matter to me if they were gay, straight, if they were transgender. It object mattnly mattered that
the uniform of the United States military. If youre willing to serve this country in uniform and willing to lay down your life to protect it, you deserve to do that. And so many more americans, including our president , has never worn the uniform. I will Stand Up And Fight for the transgender and all of our military Men And Women. Senator, appreciate your time. Thank you. Joining me now is my panel. Dana, is this just about politics, to try to either distract from the russia or Jeff Sessions or the Health Care News or feeding red meat to the base . Its almost impossible to imagine that it isnt. Now, white house sources denied that today, but it does defy any sort of logic that there is any other reason. You know, there are some reporting that and some questions about whether it was conservatives in the house who were reaching out to the president to try to get him to do this himself, so that they
because they felt like they were going to lose the issue legislatively as part of the budget. That is possible. Again what they were focusing on was more medical costs, not a total ban on transgender people. Thats right. And so that brings me to the next to the next point, is that even people who were reluctant to have Taxpayer Dollars pay for any kind of medical treatment for a transition, they did not expect that the president would just fullon reverse this allowing or put a Ban On Transgenders in the military. Not anybody on capitol hill. According to barbara starr, the people, despite what the white house is saying, who are in charge of this, who wear the uniform, and so it was a real stunner. Never mind the question of how he did it. Just random tweets without any interpretation with that, without any explanation, without
any never mind a policy paper explaining why. It was absolutely kind of Impulse Policymaking at its best. Jeff toobin, legally, the president , can he do this . Because a lot of people who were transgender in the military were essentially encouraged last year under the obama policy to come forward and identify themselves and now those who have come forward and identified themselves, i assume under this policy can maybe be fired. There certainly will be lawsuits, no doubt about it. The aclu has put out a call for potential plaintiffs who want to bring cases. The problem with challenging this change, and obviously were going have to see precisely how its spelled out and applied, is that courts give the military a great deal of deference in terms of how they organize themselves, what they view as militarily necessary deference issues likeUnit Cohesion. Theres a great reluctance of courts to second guess that. Thats why most of the dont ask, dont tell challenges failed. It was only when congress and the president , president obama, changed the policy that the Policy Changed. The courts were not nearly as helpful as they were on samesex marriage. So i think lawsuits here, they will certainly be filed but likely to be long shots. This is a political and military issue, more than an issue for the courts. Matt, is this more about politics more than military issues . I think look, there is an argument, weve had this before with gays in the military about Unit Cohesion and whether or not were focused on social engineering versus Military Readiness. But i dont think thats what this is. Its this was seemed to come out of nowhere, and the only rational is political. I think the most you listed a
few of the scenarios. The most compelling for me is that you finally now have conservatives, people like breitbart and Newt Gingrich and others, who are pumping the saying lay off of Jeff Sessions. Ann coulter, rush limbaugh. And now donald trump does something thats social conservatives, that cultural warriors would love. Seems coincidental to me. The white house told the administration was thrilled that this was getting so much coverage from the media. Does it distract whether its russia investigation i think so. The sad thing is transgender people have become the new boogeyman for social conservatives. Now i guess theyve lost the battle on gay marriage. Now theyve moved on to transgender people. You can see in the way this came out that there was no serious argument the transgender people are causing any problems in the military. Its that the cost is too much. And yet, they spend the military spends less than 1 of their budget dealing with health care costs, of their Health Care Budget dealing with Health Care Related to transgender people. They spend five times as much on viagra. So even the argument theyre putting forth is false. Its not that costly in terms of their budget, which is massive. I want to add to what you said on the politics side of this. That when you have a president who is 35 , basically hes got his base, that is still supporting him. And the fact is, and i was i spent a couple of days on capitol hill this week. You see the republican anger about what the president is doing to Jeff Sessions, who effectively brought donald trump, the conservative base, handed it to him, when he endorsed trump back during the campaign, and so now you have the president trying to reach out and say no, no, dont be mad
about that, please, please. Remember, ive got you on this. April, to kirstens point, this was an argument made about allowing africanamericans to serve in the armed forces equally in units that werent segregated. It was made about gays and lesbians. And now its on transgender people. You hit the nail squarely, anderson. In 1948, harry truman abolished segregation in the u. S. Military. He abolished it. And the federal government, that was the first piece of the federal government to really start opening up to others. And for this to happen now, many years later, its sad. This is a community, anderson, im sure as you know, there are many people who are very concerned. And i brought up a question today in the White House Briefing room, that kind of played off of major garretts question about health care for transgender military personnel. And there was a concern when
president elect donald trump was basking in the glory of his win over hillary clinton. Many in the Transgender Community were concerned about aca changing over to trump care, what it would look like with gender reassignment. They said, if we got the top done now, how could we get the bottom done . We dont know what tomorrow brings. So this community has been concerned about this president for a long time. And now this just adds more fuel to the fire, and going back to your original point, it seems like it is red meat for his supporters, but its also a deflecti deflection, i believe, from the big issue. This is a real issue, but it is deflection. He likes to throw things out there when something is bigger than he wants. Were going to continue the conversation next. Also, the president publicly criticized his Attorney General again in a new tweet that also mentions, you guessed it, hillary clinton. Im ryan and i quit smoking with chantix. I tried to quit cold turkey. I tried to quit with the patch; that didnt work. Along with support, Chantix Varenicline is proven to help people quit smoking. For me, chantix worked. It reduced my urge to smoke. Compared to the nicotine patch, chantix helped significantly more people quit smoking. When you try to quit smoking, with or without chantix, you may have nicotine withdrawal symptoms. Some people had changes in behavior or thinking, aggression, hostility, agitation, depressed mood or suicidal thoughts or actions with chantix. Serious side effects may include seizures, new or worse heart or blood vessel problems, sleepwalking or allergic and skin reactions which can be lifethreatening. Stop chantix and get help right away if you have any of these. Tell your Healthcare Provider if youve had depression or other Mental Health problems. Decrease alcohol use while taking chantix. Use caution when driving or operating machinery. The most common side effect is nausea. Im so proud to be a nonsmoker. Ask your doctor if chantix is right for you. Many insurance plans cover chantix for a low or 0 copay. When heartburn hits fight back fast with new tums chewy bites. Fast relief in every bite. Crunchy outside. Chewy inside. Tum tum tum tum new tums chewy bites. [ Light Music Playing ] youve wished upon it all year, and now its finally here. The mercedesbenz summer event is back, with incredible offers on the mercedesbenz youve always longed for. But hurry, these Shooting Stars fly by fast. Lease the c300 for 399 a month at your local mercedesbenz dealer. Mercedesbenz. The best or nothing. I tabut with my back paines, I Couldnt Sleep and get up in time. Then i found aleve pm. Aleve pm is the only one to combine a safe sleep aid plus
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s. E. A. L. What is the impact, do you think, for those Service Members who are tran