MONEY -- Last year, the U.S. military allowed openly transgender people to serve for the first time. Aaron Belkin, a professor at San Francisco State University, estimated in a Reuters story at the time that providing transition care to service members — including both gender reassignment surgeries and hormones — would cost just 22 cents per service member per month when spread out among the entire military force. He estimated that transition care would total around $5.6 million a year, a small fraction of the military’s $47.8 billion annual health care budget. Estimates by the Rand Corporation last year fell into a similar range.
“President Trump this morning simply lied about the data,” Belkin says.
Photo by Technnical Sargeant John Hughel, 142nd Fighter Wing Public Affairs/U.S. Air National Guard