This morning the president declared that transgender individuals will no longer be allowed to serve in the U.S. military, but thousands already do. That includes service members based in Alaska. Alaska Public Media’s Lori Townsend spoke with Air Force Staff Sergeant Emma Horner, who came out as transgender to her fellow military members in October, when the Department of Defense released a policy saying it would accept openly transgender people and help them transition. Horner says that coming out was a positive experience.
HORNER: Honestly, I’ve become more confident in what I do. For me it’s been only good things as far as my career goes so far.
TOWNSEND: Did it change your job at all?
HORNER: As far as my job goes, I did get a different job, just because I was away for medical things here and there. However, I love the position that I’m in now. I feel like I do more there than out on the flight light itself.
TOWNSEND: How did people that you work with, other military service-members react when you did come out?
HORNER: Honestly, I didn’t get much of a real reaction, I guess. I was away on vacation after I officially came out, which was in October, whenever everything was starting to really change. But as soon as I got back to work, nobody really addressed it too much. I had a few people come up and ask me questions, which was a surprise to me, being in a male-dominated career field. That was kind of a pleasant surprise, as far as it goes.
TOWNSEND: How about the military structure? You mentioned that other service-members ask you how you were treated by the larger structure of the Air Force. What was that like?
HORNER: I mean, it was hard. There’s a lot of roadblocks for us to overcome that, to me, seemed unnecessary. However, according to the military, they were necessary things to do. I was able to get approval — I was already on hormones — but I did get my gender marker changed — I was actually the first person on JBER to get that done as far as the Air Force side goes, which was an exciting day, which meant I could go buy female standards now, and I don’t have to use male restrooms or anything like that, which was very exciting for me.
TOWNSEND: The announcement today, from the president… what did you think when you found out President Trump intends to ban transgender people from the military.
HORNER: I was pretty shocked that it would come out the way that it came out. It was hard to hear coming from a tweet. And to hear that my job and so many of my transgender military brothers and sisters could be out of a job, out of serving a country that we love and we want to take care of and be there for, in the hardest of times.
TOWNSEND: What’s the thing that’s most concerning you about this announcement right now?
HORNER: I guess just the fact that there’s so many people that this was what they wanted to do their whole lives — was join the military and serve their country. The fact that those people are up for being kicked out, there’s a lot of fear of the unknown at this point.
TOWNSEND: I know you had just part of a day to really think about this, but how will it affect you and what will you do now?
HORNER: That’s kinda hard to say at this point. I only have a couple more months before I’m scheduled to get out of the military, as far as active duty goes anyway. I was planning on going National Guard after my time was up here because my son’s up here, and I wanted to make sure I could still be with him. I mean, that’s not something I can do anymore, and even though the job that I do now is something that they’re needing people to do it. I guess we’ll see what happens.
Lori Townsend is the chief editor, senior vice president of journalism and senior host for Alaska Public Media. You can send her news tips and program ideas for Talk of Alaska and Alaska Insight at ltownsend@alaskapublic.org or call 907-550-8452. Read more about Lori here.
