Defense Secretary Mattis Was "Appalled" By Trump's Transgender Ban Tweets

In announcing his ban on transgender service members in the U.S. military, Donald Trump made a point to say the decision was made "after consultation with my Generals and military experts," but apparently Trump blind-sided just about every on his military team.

And what he didn't make abundantly clear was the ban was actually was a snap maneuver to save money for his Mexican wall.

You know, the wall Mexico was going to pay for?

From the New York Times:

Mr. Trump made the declaration on Twitter, saying that American forces could not afford the “tremendous medical costs and disruption” of transgender service members. He said he had consulted generals and military experts, but Jim Mattis, the defense secretary, was given only a day’s notice about the decision.

Mr. Trump elected to announce the ban in order to resolve a quietly brewing fight on Capitol Hill over whether taxpayer money should pay for gender transition and hormone therapy for transgender service members. The dispute had threatened to kill a $790 billion defense and security spending package scheduled for a vote this week.

But rather than addressing that narrow issue, Mr. Trump opted to upend the entire policy on transgender service members.

His decision was announced with such haste that the White House could not answer basic inquiries about how it would be carried out, including what would happen to openly transgender people on active duty. Of eight defense officials interviewed, none could say.

Mr. Mattis, who was on vacation, was silent on the new policy. People close to the defense secretary said he was appalled that Mr. Trump chose to unveil his decision in tweets, in part because of the message they sent to transgender active-duty service members, including those deployed overseas, that they were suddenly no longer welcome.

Repeat: "The defense secretary said he was appalled..."