Caitlyn Jenner hits out at Trump’s Army Secretary pick
Caitlyn Jenner has hit out at Trump’s pick for Army Secretary over comments he made about trans people being a “disease”.
Outgoing Army Secretary Eric Fanning made history when Barack Obama appointed him to the role, becoming the first out man to head a military branch.
Donald Trump nominated a replacement for Mr Fanning last week – trying to replace the openly gay official with an anti-gay Tennessee Republican lawmaker, Mark Green.
Mr Green is the author of a Tennessee bill that would grant businesses unlimited rights to discriminate without any action from state agencies, invalidating any non-discrimination protections.
He has also attacked Obama’s civil rights protections for transgender children as an example of “tyrannical government” and said that being transgender is a “disease.”
Jenner, a former supporter of President Trump, who last week rescinded an offer to play golf with the President, hit out at Mr Green on ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’, on Fox News.
She said: “Right now, I’m really concerned with, kind of the next move for the Trump administration, is Mark Green, who’s a Republican from Tennessee, a senator. He’s up for secretary of the Army, and this guy has come out with some of the most anti-LGBT statements ever, calling me, a trans person, as a disease. I hate to tell Mark Green, I don’t have a disease, OK?
“He called about fighting the bathroom issue as, you know, the Bible tells me I have to go after evil. I’m not an evil person,” she added.
Meanwhile, he encouraged the state of Tennessee to defy the Supreme Court of the United States to continue denying same-sex couples the right to marry, and in an unearthed radio rant about transgender people called for “evil to be crushed”.
Mr Green today hit out at “liberal left” critics of his long record of anti-LGBT comments and policies.
On Facebook, Green directly linked refers to a transgender woman as a “man-turned-woman” and repeatedly brands them man.
It goes on to suggest it was inappropriate for a gay person to hold the post of Army Secretary because they “serve over troops who were morally opposed to such behaviour”.
Speaking about trans people previously, Green said: “If you poll the psychiatrists, they’re going to tell you that transgender is a disease.
“You ask about how we fix it ― how we get the toothpaste back in the tube… I gotta tell you ― it’s going to start with me being the salt and the light to the people around me.
“If you really want to bring this back to who’s at fault, we got to look a little bit inwardly. We’ve tolerated immorality. And we’re reflecting light.”
Jenner this week revealed that she once considered suicide, before coming out as transgender.
Last week, the Olympian-turned-reality star, said she had “changed her mind” on same-sex marriage, after previously saying she was alienated by Ellen for disagreeing with it.
