Rep. Joe Kennedy III, the Massachusetts Democrat picked to deliver the party’s State of the Union rebuttal, will bring a transgender soldier to President Donald Trump’s address to protest the administration’s order banning transgender people from serving in any capacity in the U.S. military, the Boston Globe reports.
“I want her to be there as a real person, and the face of an inhumane policy,” he said.
Trump’s transgender ban is being legally challenged, with plaintiffs this week asking a federal court to permanently halt the Trump administration from enforcing a ban.
Staff Sergeant Patricia King, 37, who will attend Trump's State of the Union Tuesday night as Kennedy’s guest, is one of the soldiers whose future is uncertain.
“I have served for almost 19 years,” she said. “And all of a sudden, it is all hanging in the balance.”
King was the first service member to have her gender reassignment surgery paid for by the military months after Trump tweeted that U.S. forces could not afford the “tremendous medical costs and disruption” of transgender service members.
“There are much easier ways to get surgery covered than enlisting in the military, [facing] the possibility of deployment, and dealing with the stigma of being a transgender service member,” she said. “Every one of us who raises our right hand is prepared to give everything in the defense of our country.”
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.