US President Donald Trump has signed executive orders barring transgender people from enlisting in the military and cracking down on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs.
The order also reinstates military personnel who were stood down for refusing COVID-19 vaccinations during the pandemic.
It follows the president's wider scrapping of DEI programs in federal government departments in an executive order he signed shortly after being inaugurated on January 20.
DEI laws and programs have been under attack for years by Republicans who contend that the measures threaten merit-based hiring and promotion opportunities for white people, specifically men.
However, DEI supporters say the programs are necessary to ensure that institutions meet the needs of increasingly diverse populations and the impact of the loss of these measures goes beyond people of colour.
The Trump administration claims that removing these initiatives from the US military will help boost recruitment levels and lower costs.
The latest order will update "all Department of Defense medical standards to ensure they prioritise readiness and lethality," according to NBC.
New Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has promised to bring major changes to the Pentagon, and he has made eliminating DEI from the military a top priority.
"There are more executive orders coming," Hegseth told reporters.
Here's what we know about the new administration plans for DEI programs.
What is DEI?
DEI is an acronym for diversity, equity and inclusion.
It is a label given to measures in workplaces to ensure people of all backgrounds gain access to, and thrive at, organisations.
According to the University of Notre Dame, DEI programmes can be traced back to the mid-1960s when societal movements and legal changes began to reshape the corporate world.
Such initiatives are aimed at addressing longstanding structural racism and sexism by promoting opportunities in the workplace for women, ethnic minorities, LGBTQ+ people and other under-represented groups.
Trump has called the programmes "discrimination" and insisted on restoring strictly "merit-based" hiring.
What will the military executive order involve?
It is not clear what exactly this executive order will mean for transgender service members.
Trump banned transgender people from joining the miliary back in 2017, arguing that transgender service members cost too much.
According to a 2016 study conducted by the non-profit think tank RAND Corporation, the additional costs of transgender medical care would only be a drop in the bucket for the Pentagon's annual budget.
The ban was repealed by Joe Biden in 2021.
Transgender veteran Patricia King told ABC News Channel thousands of transgender service members will have to wait to see how it would affect them.
"We're not entirely sure yet what will happen as the order hasn't come out, but if we look back at what happened in 2017, we know that Donald Trump issued an order to the secretary of defence to go ahead and start the process of removing transgender service members," she said.
"So if past is prologue we might see something like that but it's too soon to speculate."
Sergeant King said transgender service members were not too costly.
"We happen to know that (for) transgender service members, the cost of each service member is roughly $640 in cost per year, it's not high and as far as the time and training, all service members meet with their medical providers to find the fastest path regardless of what medical treatment they might need."
Sergeant King argued against the idea that transgender service members affect "unit cohesion", another argument for the changes made in White House documents cited by Reuters and multiple US publications.
"What affects unit cohesion is telling a unit that somebody who has been there for years is going to be removed from the fight, telling a unit that somebody who is supposed to deploy with them, their battle buddy that's supposed to watch their back is not going to be there, that affects unit cohesion," Sergeant King said.
What else does it mean for the military?
The signing of the orders will also mean that thousands who were kicked out of the military for refusing to get vaccinated against COVID-19 will be reinstated.
More detail is yet to emerge on this.
Other DEI programmes already affected by the new orders created uproar when reported over the weekend.
Educational videos about storied Air Force groups the Tuskegee Airmen and Women's Airforce Service Pilots, or WASPs, were removed to comply with the new DEI orders.
They were quickly reinstated.
Chief of Staff General David Allvin said in a statement they will continue to be taught in basic military training.
"The historic legacy and decorated valor these Airmen embodied during World War II and beyond will continue to guide our newest recruits and all who serve in our ranks."
Who has already followed suit?
The move forms part of a larger, government-wide effort to remove DEI practices from the federal workforce.
On his first day in the White House, Mr Trump signed an executive order ordering a sweeping dismantling of the federal government's DEI programs.
The executive order on affirmative action revokes an order issued by president Lyndon Johnson, and curtails DEI programs by federal contractors and grant recipients.
It's using one of the key tools utilised by the Biden administration to promote DEI programs across the private sector — pushing their use by federal contractors — to now eradicate them.
It ordered all federal diversity, equity and inclusion staff to be paid leave and eventually be laid off.
In a memo issued last Tuesday, The Office of Personnel Management directed agencies to place DEI office staffers on paid leave by 5pm on Wednesday, and take down all public DEI-focused webpages by the same deadline.
Several federal departments had removed the webpages even before the memorandum.
Agencies must also cancel any DEI-related training and end any related contracts, and federal workers are being asked to report to Mr Trump's Office of Personnel Management if they suspect any DEI-related program has been renamed to obfuscate its purpose within 10 days or face "adverse consequences".
Diversity already stalling in corporate America
Some large US companies had made limited progress in promoting women and were diluting or abandoning equal opportunity initiatives even before Mr Trump launched his nationwide campaign to scrap them, underscoring a shift in corporate priorities.
Months before, however, big US household names from Meta to Walmart had already moved to scrap or curtail their DEI programmes.
On Friday, retailer Target became the latest high-profile US name to roll back its diversity programmes.
Gender diversity experts say the departure from equal opportunity initiatives marks a shift in US boardroom attitudes after many had ramped up DEI efforts in the aftermath of the 2020 murder of George Floyd, a Black man who died after a Minneapolis police officer kneeled on his neck for about 9 minutes.
About three years prior, the '#MeToo' movement had gained global prominence, prompting conversations about women's issues in the workplace and scrutiny around inequity and harassment.
Yet, the last couple of years have seen a backlash against equal opportunity initiatives in some sections of American society.
In June 2023, the conservative-leaning US Supreme Court ruled against affirmative action in university admissions. The verdict sparked a wave of lawsuits by conservative groups against DEI programmes in the workplace.
"In a shift from recent years, (companies) are no longer willing to put their head above the parapet," said Carlota Esguevillas, head of responsible investment at EdenTree Investment Management, a sustainable investment manager based in the UK.
