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Colorado Trans Service Members Speak Out

Colorado Trans Service Members Speak Out

“I am a U.S. Marine and will always be a Marine. I am also a transgender woman.”

Add to that: badass. Whether leading her platoon into hand-to-hand combat in Iraq or fighting for the rights of service members in courtrooms as an attorney, Emma Shinn is a bad ass.

I first met up with Shinn at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Detention Center in Aurora. She is defending an undocumented resident held here. My first thought was how striking she is. Among the other attorneys gathered here, she stands out. Standing 6’1 in an elegant black pant suit, Shinn has soft shoulder-length blonde hair, and carries herself with the kind of “don’t mess with me” attitude only a former soldier can possess.

It’s that same attitude that brought her here today. To speak out against President Trump’s call to ban all transgender people from the military.

“It’s very much a [situation of] can someone cover your back, cover your six, and that’s really all that matters,” she said. And she should know.

As a battalion leader during the now historic Operation Phantom Fury, she helped overtake and then rebuild the Iraqi stronghold of Fallujah. Her tank was at the center when her platoon was hit by a coordinated ambush with machine guns and grenade launchers.

“We got rocked pretty hard,” she said. “I had grooves in the barrel of my .50 caliber machine gun from rounds bouncing off of it.”

It’s heroics like this that brought dozens of Coloradans into the streets to protest the proposed ban. Not one, but two rallies were held in Denver following Trump’s July 26th tweets announcing his plan for the ban.

Shinn served for 20 years, on every continent except Antarctica.

Now a practicing attorney, she is one of the estimated 135,000 trans veterans or retired personnel from the National Guard or Reserve service. Those figures come from a Defense Department commissioned study done by the Rand Corporation. They’re considered the most accurate because the research is survey based and captures not only those serving openly, but the majority who serve while still in the closet.

Colorado based Air Force Staff Sergeant, Logan Ireland, is trying to change that.

A security forces airman who deployed to Kandahar, Afghanistan, he came out as transgender in 2015, three years after his transition began.

“We served in silence for too long,” he said. “As brothers and sisters, we will not rest until equality rings true.”

Rand estimates right now there are 15,500 active duty and reserve transgender servicemen and women. Last year the Department of Defense told them it was okay to serve openly. Thousands came out. Now, they could lose their jobs, their pensions, and their retirement.

“For my president to deny an able bodied, fully qualified person the inherent right to raise their right hand and serve their country, potentially giving their own life for our freedoms, is doing this country an injustice,” Ireland said.

This is in sharp contrast to 2015 when his Air Force unit sent him to the White House to meet with then President Barack Obama. Since then he’s been working with about 100 transgender recruits. They were scheduled to begin service July 1 of this year. So far, that has not happened.

Because of his active duty status, he is limited in what he can now say. But, in earlier interviews with the media, Ireland questioned why the U.S. would drag its feet on letting in transgender recruits at a time when recruitment is down.

The newest estimates from the Pew Research Center show only 13 to 20 percent of those trying to get into the military meet qualifying standards. Of those serving, 40 percent are racial and ethnic minorities. With Trump’s approval rating among non-whites hovering under 20 percent, there is concern the number of incoming recruits will drop even more.

“It’s like throwing away 15 battalions of highly trained qualified troops,” said Shinn. “Trans people have been serving since the dawn of time, it’s just whether we’re serving openly or not.”

Trump’s reasoning? In one of the three tweets, he stated “Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail.”

Shortly thereafter, detractors started pointing out the military spends 10 times more on Viagra than transgender health care. The Rand report estimated health care costs for transgender soldiers to run between $2.4 to $8.4 million a year. Yet, the Defense Health Agency recorded the military spending $84.2 million in 2014 on erectile dysfunction medications.

Shinn points to a F-35 jetfighter. Already the most expensive weapons program in U.S. history, this summer’s government estimates have it tipping the $1.5 trillion mark.

“Each F-35 costs $35 million and it doesn’t even fly yet . . . Not having one unproven aircraft can fund eight years of trans service health care,” she said.

More concerning, for both Shinn and Ireland, is the part of Trump’s tweets that refer to transgender military members as a “disruption”.

“Without fault or failure, 18 other allied countries have allowed transgender troops to service in their militaries since the 90s,” said Ireland. The Rand report studied those foreign militaries and found “in no case was there any evidence of an effect on the operational effectiveness, operational readiness, or cohesion of the force.”

For now, life goes on. Shinn is finding civilian life more forgiving than the current military climate. After transitioning last year, she says she has not lost one, single client. In fact, she says her law firm has grown. She’s heading up the Colorado Name Change Project. It provides pro bono legal services for transgender individuals seeking to update their documents. And Shinn was selected as the 2017 Attorney of the Year by the Colorado LGBT Bar Association.

Ireland is currently taking part in security forces training. He tells the Air Force Times he will not go down without a fight.

“I would like to see them try to kick me out of my military. You are not going to deny me my right to serve my country when I am fully qualified and able and willing to give my life.”

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