Doe v. Trump, 275 F. Supp. 3d 167

Background

In July–August 2017 President Trump announced via Twitter and then a Presidential Memorandum that transgender individuals would be barred from military service (accession indefinitely delayed) and that the military must authorize discharge of transgender service members by March 23, 2018; a plan was due Feb. 21, 2018. Secretary Mattis issued interim guidance preserving some protections pending implementation.
Plaintiffs are current service members and aspiring accessions (including Naval Academy midshipman and ROTC cadet) who are transgender and allege imminent harms: denial of accession, risk of discharge, loss of benefits, stigma, and disrupted medical care.
Before the Presidential Memorandum, DoD had studied the issue (RAND report, DoD Working Group) and issued a June 30, 2016 Directive permitting open service and setting accession procedures to begin Jan. 1, 2018.
Plaintiffs sued claiming the Memorandum violates the Fifth Amendment’s equal protection component and sought a nationwide preliminary injunction enjoining the Memorandum’s Accession and Retention Directives. Defendants moved to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction and for failure to state claims.
The court held plaintiffs have standing and their claims are ripe as to the Accession and Retention Directives, denied dismissal on the Due Process/equal-protection claim, dismissed without prejudice the estoppel claim and the challenge to the sex-reassignment-surgery funding ban for lack of plaintiff-specific injury, and granted a preliminary injunction blocking enforcement of the Accession and Retention Directives (reverting policy to June 30, 2016 DTM / Mattis modifications).

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Standing for Accession and Retention challenge	Plaintiffs (current and aspiring members) face imminent, concrete injuries: a competitive barrier to accession, substantial risk of discharge, and stigma—redressable by injunction	Memorandum is a directive to study policy; interim guidance preserves status quo; harms speculative until implementation	Court: Plaintiffs likely have standing—injuries are concrete, imminent or substantially likely; interim guidance does not negate the Memorandum’s operative directives
Ripeness of constitutional challenge	Facial equal-protection challenge to the Memorandum is a purely legal question and fit for review; delay would cause real hardship	Challenge targets a future implementation and unsettled policy; courts should await final military rule	Court: Challenge ripe as directives are definite, must be executed by fixed dates, and facts underlying issuance are set
Level of scrutiny under Fifth Amendment	Discrimination against transgender persons is at least quasi-suspect; also constitutes sex/gender-stereotyping discrimination -> intermediate scrutiny	Military deference and national-defense judgments justify deferential review	Court: Applies heightened (intermediate) scrutiny (quasi-suspect class and sex-stereotyping) despite military context
Likelihood of success on the merits	Memorandum lacks an exceedingly persuasive justification: stated military concerns are unsupported, overbroad, contradicted by DoD studies, and announcement circumstances suggest animus	Government asserts important interests (readiness, deployability, costs, unit cohesion) and need for further study; military deference warranted	Court: Plaintiffs likely to succeed—reasons are speculative/overbroad and contradicted by prior DoD review; animating circumstances weigh against citation of legitimate justification

Key Cases Cited

Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555 (standing requires concrete, particularized and imminent injury)
Winter v. Natural Resources Defense Council, 555 U.S. 7 (preliminary injunction standards)
United States v. Virginia, 518 U.S. 515 (intermediate scrutiny and the "exceedingly persuasive justification" standard for sex-based classifications)
Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620 (laws motivated by animus may fail even if facially neutral in some respects)
United States v. Windsor, 570 U.S. 744 (Fifth Amendment equal protection and scrutiny of government classifications targeting a group)
City of Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center, 473 U.S. 432 (rational-basis review baseline and identifying suspect/quasi-suspect-class criteria)
Adarand Constructors, Inc. v. Peña, 515 U.S. 200 (standing and equal protection principles applied to government allocation programs)
Clapper v. Amnesty Int’l USA, 568 U.S. 398 (standing requires non-speculative chain of events for future injury)
Rostker v. Goldberg, 453 U.S. 57 (military judgments may receive deference but courts still adjudicate constitutional claims)