At some point you've got to hand it Donald Trump, he continually finds ways of outdoing himself as a truly piss-poor example of a human being. His perpetual ability to seem like he's left no stone unturned in his attempts to antagonise as many people as possible, only for him to suddenly find a giant boulder to flip over and unleash a hot new load of Trump vitriol.
In the wake of his inexplicable ban on trans-gender people serving in the armed forces, which he announced today on Twitter, it's important to show just how many people that his malicious policy affects.
After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow......
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017
....Transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming.....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017
....victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017
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His series of three tweets outlining the ban came seemingly out of the blue and left people stunned, both due to the capricious nature of the ban and because it was entirely unexpected. This was further illustrated by the fact that the White House didn't even have a press statement ready to publish when he sent his tweets.
Though there are no official statistics available for the number of transgender people serving in the U.S. armed forces, a conservative estimate puts the number at 2,450 while other groups such as the Transgender American Veterans Association say there are closer to 15,500 transgender people serving in the armed forces.
Regardless of the full scale of the number of people affected, it is a damning indictment of Trump's contempt for human rights.
