Ensuring Military Readiness Act of 2023
This bill requires the Department of Defense (DOD) to prescribe regulations regarding military service by individuals who identify as transgender.
Under the regulations, individuals who identify as transgender with a history or diagnosis of gender dysphoria must be disqualified from military service, with some exceptions. (The bill defines gender dysphoria as a marked incongruence between one's experienced or expressed gender and biological sex.)
The regulations must provide exceptions for such individuals if they have been
Under the regulations, members of the Armed Forces who have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria may continue to serve in their biological sex (regardless of any changes previously made to their gender marker in the Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System, or DEERS) and receive medically necessary treatment for gender dysphoria. However, such treatment may not include gender transition procedures.
Individuals who identify as transgender and who seek or have undergone gender transition are disqualified from military service.
Additionally, individuals who identify as transgender, do not have a history or diagnosis of gender dysphoria, and are otherwise qualified for service may serve in the Armed Forces in their biological sex.
DOD must prescribe regulations updating DEERS to require the gender markers for members of the Armed Forces to match their biological sex, regardless of any previous changes.
[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 1112 Introduced in House (IH)]
<DOC>
118th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 1112
To provide requirements related to the eligibility of individuals who
identify as transgender from serving in the Armed Forces.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
February 21, 2023
Mr. Banks introduced the following bill; which was referred to the
Committee on Armed Services
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To provide requirements related to the eligibility of individuals who
identify as transgender from serving in the Armed Forces.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Ensuring Military Readiness Act of
2023''.
SEC. 2. LIMITATIONS ON MILITARY SERVICE BY INDIVIDUALS WHO IDENTIFY AS
TRANSGENDER.
Not later than 90 days after the date of the enactment of this Act,
the Secretary of Defense shall prescribe regulations regarding service
of individuals who identify as transgender as follows:
(1) Persons who identify as transgender with a history of
diagnosis of gender dysphoria are disqualified from military
service except under the following limited circumstances:
(A) Individuals may serve in the Armed Forces if
they have been stable for 36 consecutive months in
their biological sex prior to accession.
(B) Members of the Armed Forces diagnosed with
gender dysphoria after entering into service may be
retained if they do not undergo gender transition
procedures and remain deployable within applicable
retention standards for their biological sex.
(C) Members of the Armed Forces serving as of the
date of the enactment of this Act who have been
diagnosed with gender dysphoria may continue to serve
only in their biological sex, irrespective of any
changes previously made to their gender marker in the
Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System
(DEERS), and receive medically necessary treatment for
gender dysphoria. Such treatment may not include gender
transition procedures.
(2) Persons who identify as transgender who seek or have
undergone gender transition are disqualified from military
service.
(3) Persons who identify as transgender without a history
or diagnosis of gender dysphoria, who are otherwise qualified
for service and meet all physical and mental requirements, may
serve in the Armed Forces in their biological sex.
SEC. 3. REVISED REGULATIONS REGARDING GENDER MARKINGS.
Not later than 90 days after the date of the enactment of this Act,
the Secretary of Defense shall prescribe regulations updating the
Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System (DEERS) to require the
gender markers for members of the Armed Forces to match their
biological sex, irrespective of any previous changes allowed.
SEC. 4. DEFINITIONS.
In this Act:
(1) Cross-sex hormones.--The term ``cross-sex hormones''
means testosterone or other androgens given to biological
females at doses that are profoundly larger or more potent than
would normally occur naturally in healthy biological females,
or estrogen given to biological males at doses that are
profoundly larger or more potent than would normally occur
naturally in healthy biological males.
(2) Gender.--The term ``gender'' means the psychological,
behavioral, social, and cultural aspects of being male or
female.
(3) Gender dysphoria.--The term ``gender dysphoria'' means
a marked incongruence between one's experienced or expressed
gender and biological sex.
(4) Gender transition.--The term ``gender transition''
means the process by which a person goes from identifying with
and living as a gender that corresponds to his or her
biological sex to identifying with and living as a gender
different from his or her biological sex, and may involve
social, legal, or physical changes.
(5) Gender transition procedures.--The term ``gender
transition procedures''--
(A) means--
(i) any medical or surgical intervention,
including physician's services, inpatient and
outpatient hospital services, or prescribed
drugs related to gender transition, that seeks
to alter or remove physical or anatomical
characteristics or features that are typical
for the individual's biological sex or to
instill or create physiological or anatomical
characteristics that resemble a sex different
from the individual's birth sex, including
medical services that provide puberty-blocking
drugs, cross-sex hormones, or other mechanisms
to promote the development of feminizing or
masculinizing features (in the opposite sex);
and
(ii) genital or non-genital gender
transition surgery performed for the purpose of
assisting an individual with a gender
transition; and
(B) does not include--
(i) services to those born with a
medically-verifiable disorder of sex
development, including a person with external
biological sex characteristics that are
irresolvably ambiguous, such as those born with
46 XX chromosomes with virilization, 46 XY
chromosomes with undervirilization, or having
both ovarian and testicular tissue;
(ii) services provided when a physician has
otherwise diagnosed a disorder of sexual
development, in which the physician has
determined through genetic or biochemical
testing that the person does not have normal
sex chromosome structure, sex steroid hormone
production, or sex steroid hormone action for a
biological male or biological female; or
(iii) the treatment of any infection,
injury, disease, or disorder that has been
caused by or exacerbated by the performance of
gender transition procedures, whether or not
the gender transition procedure was performed
in accordance with State and Federal law or
whether or not funding for the gender
transition procedure is permissible.
(6) Gender transition surgery.--The term ``gender
transition surgery'' means any medical or surgical service that
seeks to surgically alter or remove healthy physical or
anatomical characteristics or features that are typical for the
individual's biological sex in order to instill or create
physiological or anatomical characteristics that resemble a sex
different from the individual's birth sex, including genital or
non-genital gender reassignment surgery performed for the
purpose of assisting an individual with a gender transition.
(7) Genital gender transition surgery.--The term ``genital
gender transition surgery'' includes surgical procedures such
as penectomy, orchiectomy, vaginoplasty, clitoroplasty, or
vulvoplasty for biologically male patients or hysterectomy,
ovariectomy, reconstruction of the fixed part of the urethra
with or without a metoidioplasty or a phalloplasty,
vaginectomy, scrotoplasty, or implantation of erection or
testicular prostheses for biologically female patients, when
performed for the purpose of assisting an individual with a
gender transition.
(8) Non-genital gender transition surgery.--The term ``non-
genital gender transition surgery''--
(A) includes, when performed for the purpose of
assisting an individual with a gender transition--
(i) surgical procedures such as
augmentation mammoplasty, facial feminization
surgery, liposuction, lipofilling, voice
surgery, thyroid cartilage reduction, gluteal
augmentation (implants or lipofilling), hair
reconstruction, or various aesthetic procedures
for biologically male patients; or
(ii) subcutaneous mastectomy, voice
surgery, liposuction, lipofilling, pectoral
implants or various aesthetic procedures for
biologically female patients; and
(B) does not include any procedure undertaken
because the individual suffers from a physical
disorder, physical injury, or physical illness that
would, as certified by a physician, place the
individual in imminent danger of death or impairment of
major bodily function unless surgery is performed,
unless the procedure is for the purpose of a gender
transition.
(9) Puberty-blocking drugs.--The term ``puberty-blocking
drugs'' means, when used to delay or suppress pubertal
development in children for the purpose of assisting an
individual with a gender transition--
(A) Gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) analogues
or other synthetic drugs used in biological males to
stop luteinizing hormone secretion and therefore
testosterone secretion; and
(B) synthetic drugs used in biological females that
stop the production of estrogen and progesterone.
(10) Sex; birth sex; biological sex.--The terms ``sex'',
``birth sex,'' and ``biological sex'' refer to the biological
indication of male and female in the context of reproductive
potential or capacity, such as sex chromosomes, naturally
occurring sex hormones, gonads, and non-ambiguous internal and
external genitalia present at birth, without regard to an
individual's psychological, chosen, or subjective experience of
gender.
<all>
Introduced in House
Introduced in House
Referred to the House Committee on Armed Services.
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