Eli Lake, Columnist

Love Loses With Trump's Trans Military Ban. (So Does America.)

Imagine how disheartening it would be for jihadis if America stood up for inclusion.

July 26, 2017 at 7:30 PM UTC

Eli Lake is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering national security and foreign policy. He was the senior national security correspondent for the Daily Beast and covered national security and intelligence for the Washington Times, the New York Sun and UPI.

1501097311_GettyImages-688317052 — Photographer: Win McNamee/Getty Images

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There are many reasons to cringe at President Donald Trump's decision to reinstate the ban on transgender people in the military. It's un-American to exclude a whole group of people who are willing and able to serve. It plays to the base instincts of the president's core supporters. It marginalizes Americans who in the last few years have made great strides to achieving legal equality.

But in addition to all of this, Trump's decision Wednesday is a strategic error in the current war against jihadis. Think about it like this. The enemy seeks to recreate a caliphate where homosexuality and gender bending would be punishable by death. They advertise this all the time.