I'm a Space Force Colonel. Trump Fired Me for Being Transgender

Reflections on the deeply un-American trans service ban.

The author’s last day in uniform.

I know what it feels like to stand on the shore as a hurricane makes landfall. I saw the storm forming in the distance when over $200 million was spent in the last two months of the 2024 presidential campaign on anti-transgender advertising. It strengthened after the election when President Trump declared that he would end the “transgender lunacy” on Day One. The language used in the executive order on January 27, 2025 was Category 5. Transgender service members like me were labeled undisciplined, dishonorable liars, who lacked the humility required for military service.

I joined the Air Force after the attacks on 9/11 and served 18 years before recommissioning into the Space Force, rising to the rank of colonel. But this year, the White House began the process to remove me and other transgender service members from the military. Despite nearly a decade of serving openly as transgender, we were no longer measured by our ability to meet standards or accomplish missions, but by a characteristic unrelated to our performance. The message was unmistakable: our service is suspect and unwanted, not because of what we’ve done, but because of who we are.

I wish I could say I was surprised. We’d weathered a similar storm before. So how did we arrive here again—and what do we do now?

The First Storm

In 2016 I came out the day the military first allowed transgender people to serve openly. My authenticity didn’t distract from the mission—it fueled it. I became a stronger leader when I stopped hiding who I was. My colleagues and I performed better together because we trusted each other.

One year later, the storm found us. In 2017, during the first Trump administration, the attempt to bar transgender people blasted like a lightning bolt from a clear blue sky—tweets announcing that our government “will not accept or allow” us to serve. We were stunned, but we endured. We kept showing up, kept meeting the standard, kept doing the jobs we’d sworn to do. The policy that eventually settled into place was a ban. No one could come out while in service and no openly transgender person could join the military. Those of us who had already come out were an endangered species expected to just peter out.

The years that followed proved that service, done openly and with integrity, transforms an organization from the inside. It also changes the person serving. My colleagues and I have built resilience through adversity, developed enhanced empathy, and seen good leadership triumphing over fear. Our authentic service wasn’t a distraction; it was a force multiplier—building trust and enhancing performance.

By 2019, Americans had largely judged our service on the evidence. Roughly 85% of adults under 30, and over 70% of adults overall, supported open transgender military service. That support didn’t materialize because of a slogan. It came from seeing us execute the mission: from watching my colleagues lead companies, teach cadets, fly aircraft, penetrate adversary networks, deploy to combat zones, and bring troops safely home.

The Second Storm

In 2025, the storm didn’t strike like lightning; it churned like a growing tropical depression. Models wobbled. Tracks shifted. We watched the projected storm surge and wondered whether it would wash our careers—and our contributions—out to sea. Then, Hurricane “Prioritizing Military Excellence and Readiness” came ashore.

The policy flowing from the executive order wasn’t just a ban on accessions. It was a purge striking people who had been serving with distinction. Implementation timelines were spelled out in weeks and service members were given a choice of taking the carrot of a “voluntary” separation or the stick of an “involuntary” one with unknown consequences. If it was a choice it was Sophie’s version—it wasn’t voluntary for any of us.

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The courts did step in, but despite rulings that said the government’s case lacked merit and was dripping with animus—that our records were Exhibit A as to why we should be serving—the reprieve was temporary. In May, the Supreme Court, seemingly ignorant of the real harms being done by the purge, answered the government’s emergency appeal and the injunctions were lifted, allowing enforcement. With new deadlines in place, all transgender troops would be dismissed before the cases made it through the appellate process and back to the Supreme Court.

The chill that set in reached beyond policy into people’s lives. Friends hesitated to publicly like or comment on posts about what was happening. Colleagues messaged me privately, sharing their fear of being seen, as if visibility itself had become an operational risk. Senior leaders knew that if they spoke publicly in our defense, they would be the next ones fired.

Erasure crept in—on websites, in school libraries, in official language. When participation in ordinary civic conversation is dangerous, democracy itself feels brittle, like it could fracture at any moment. That is the chilling effect of cruelty in power.

I felt the freeze personally. Crisis response became my full-time second job: scanning for the next policy shoe to drop, bracing for impact, trying to steady others. My curiosity—so necessary for good leadership—narrowed to survival. The best antidote I knew was the one I’ve preached for years: hope in action. Hope is not naïveté; it is discipline. It’s persistent truth-telling; it’s choosing to speak even when your voice shakes; it’s asking, “Who needs me now?” and showing up for them.

While the crisis was happening, my day job continued: defining the space capabilities that would ensure America’s ability to prevail in future conflicts, including implementing this administration’s priorities. We were as busy as we’d ever been and my boss was pleading up the chain of command to do whatever could be done to keep me. I continued to give everything I had to the nation that called me to service.

But then I found myself placed on administrative leave—a new concept for the military, one that was implemented just for us. Now there was a uniform hanging in my closet like a promise I wouldn’t be allowed to keep. My government said my willingness and service record no longer mattered.

Why We Serve

People often ask me why I kept going and what keeps me dedicated to public service. The answer is simple: I serve because I still care—about the ideals embedded in the Constitution I swore an oath to defend; about leaving the institution better than I found it; about the people to my left and right; about shattering stereotypes simply by showing up and doing the work well. If prejudice writes transgender service members out of the ranks, I want history to record only the bias of those who attempted the erasure—not any failure on our parts to meet the standard.

That standard matters. The U.S. military has always been at its best when it judges people by performance and provides everyone the opportunity to show it. Our diversity of experience and background is a strategic advantage. When transgender people meet or exceed the same standards as every other American in uniform—and we do—our service strengthens national security. Turning away qualified volunteers or removing proven performers because of gender identity is not only wasteful; it violates the principles that define us as a nation. If you meet the standard, your service should be welcomed.

I’ve seen the power of that ethos. Serving openly creates space for trust—the kind that lets you solve problems together. Colin Powell said, “The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care.” When I let my shields down with my gender transition, I let others in. Several of my officers brought me deeply personal challenges they were experiencing which were bleeding into their work performance. Before, they thought I wouldn’t care, but when they saw some of my humanity they brought the issues to me and we were able to solve them together.

America’s Promise

In the eye of the storm, transgender service members have done what Americans in uniform always do: keep faith with our oath, take care of our people, plan for the worst, work for the best. Policy can end our careers, but it cannot undo what we have proven under pressure and in harm’s way.

By the end of 2025, my administrative leave will become a final termination. I will trade the combat boots I can no longer wear for shoes fit for different battlefields, where the same oath can be lived in new ways. And when I step into whatever comes next, I intend to lead with the same steadiness and hope that carried me through these storms.

The patriotism I claim is contribution, not grievance; resolve, not bitterness. I’m grateful for the years I wore our nation’s cloth, and I will keep serving the same ideals out of uniform: equal justice, equal opportunity, consent of the governed. Those words do not enforce themselves; people enforce them. Excluding capable Americans from that work weakens the republic we swear to defend.

So we will do what good leaders and good teammates do. We will tell our stories, show our results, stand up for one another, and make it easier for the next person to be judged by their performance. Storms pass. Standards endure. And if we hold fast—to our oath, to each other, and to the evidence of our service—America’s promise will outlast this weather.

Bree Fram is a colonel in the U.S. Space Force, currently on administrative leave. The views presented are hers and do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government or the Department of Defense.

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