By Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Transgender service members will be separated from the U.S. military unless they receive an exemption, according to a Pentagon memo filed in court on Wednesday, essentially banning them from joining or serving in the military.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order last month that took aim at transgender troops in a personal way – at one point saying that a man identifying as a woman was “not consistent with the humility and selflessness required of a service member.”

This month, the Pentagon had said that the U.S. military will no longer allow transgender individuals to join and will stop performing or facilitating procedures associated with gender transition for service members.

Wednesday’s late-evening memo goes further.

The memo said that the Pentagon must create a procedure to identify troops who are transgender within 30 days and then within 30 days of that, must separate them from the military.

“It is the policy of the United States Government to establish high standards for service member readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity, and integrity,” said the memo, dated February 26.

“This policy is inconsistent with the medical, surgical, and mental health constraints on individuals with gender dysphoria or who have a current diagnosis or history of, or exhibit symptoms consistent with, gender dysphoria,” it added.

The military has about 1.3 million active-duty personnel, according to Department of Defense data. Although transgender rights advocates say there are as many as 15,000 transgender service members, officials say the number is in the low thousands.

(Reporting by Idrees Ali, Phil Stewart and Ismail Shakil. Editing by Gerry Doyle)

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