Serving your country while trans

Summary

Today, Explained: Serving Your Country While Trans
Vox Podcast Network | Release Date: March 5, 2025

---

Overview

In the March 5, 2025 episode of Today, Explained, hosts Noel King and Sean Rameswaram delve into the newly implemented Pentagon policy that mandates the separation of transgender service members from the U.S. military. The episode provides an in-depth analysis of the policy's specifics, the rationale behind its implementation, its potential impact on service members, and the personal toll it takes on those affected. Through expert interviews and personal narratives, the podcast sheds light on the complexities and emotional weight of this controversial decision.

---

1. New Pentagon Policy on Transgender Service Members

A. Policy Details and Implementation

Noel King introduces the topic by highlighting a significant shift in military policy regarding transgender individuals. The discussion centers around a policy memo that officially declares transgender service members ineligible for military service.

• Policy Mandate:
  "Individuals who have a diagnosis or history of gender dysphoria are no longer eligible to serve as of today," stated an unnamed Pentagon official at [02:40].

• Gender Classification:
  The policy enforces a strict binary understanding of gender, stating, "There are only two genders, male and female," as noted by Noel King at [00:14].

• Pronoun Usage and Medical Funding:
  Service members must use pronouns that align with their assigned gender, and the DoD is prohibited from funding gender transition-related medical procedures.

• Exceptions:
  The policy allows for case-by-case exceptions if a service member's role directly supports war-fighting capabilities or if they have demonstrated stability in their gender identity over 36 months without attempting to transition.

B. Rationale Behind the Policy

The Pentagon official explains that the primary justification for this policy revolves around deployability and the perceived impact on military cohesion and readiness.

• Deployability Concerns:
  "Being transgendered in the military causes complications," Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth remarked at [00:32].

• Values Alignment:
  The policy goes beyond medical readiness, asserting that transgender individuals may not align with military values such as honesty, humility, and integrity. "Individuals who have gender dysphoria... are inconsistent with the honesty, humility and integrity that's required in the military," the official elaborated at [06:26].

C. Impact and Scope

The policy is expected to affect a significant number of service members, though exact figures remain unclear.

• Numbers Affected:
  According to the Pentagon official, there are approximately over 4,000 troops diagnosed with gender dysphoria across active duty, National Guard, and Reserve components [04:20]. However, not all transgender individuals have a medical diagnosis, potentially impacting around 1,000 service members seeking gender-affirming surgery by 2025.

D. Legal Challenges and Future Implications

Historical context is provided by referencing previous attempts to ban transgender individuals in the military, which led to numerous lawsuits.

• Previous Legal Battles:
  In 2017, multiple lawsuits challenged President Trump's initial ban, which the Supreme Court allowed to take effect in 2019 without ruling on its merits [08:35 - 09:34].

• Current Legal Climate:
  The Department of Defense faces ongoing litigation, with recent court filings questioning the extent of DoD's expenditures and the precise number of individuals affected [10:04]. The outcome remains uncertain, with the policy likely to undergo rigorous judicial scrutiny.

---

2. Personal Story: Petty Officer 2nd Class Sam Rodriguez

A. Background and Service

Petty Officer 2nd Class Sam Rodriguez shares his personal journey as a transmasculine non-binary individual serving in the U.S. Navy since 2015.

• Motivation to Serve:
  "I wanted to join the military... to be a mental health provider. I wanted to serve the people within the military," Rodriguez explains [16:10].

• Service Record:
  Rodriguez has maintained an exemplary service record, avoiding disciplinary actions and earning various personal and unit awards.

B. Impact of the Policy on His Life and Career

The newly implemented policy directly threatens Rodriguez's career and personal stability.

• Career Disruption:
  Rodriguez was selected for a clinical fellowship intended to bolster his role as a mental health provider within the Navy. The policy's enforcement jeopardizes his upcoming fellowship and potentially ends his 20-year military career [21:19].

• Family and Financial Strain:
  "I have a wife, I have two kids... we can't afford to live in our housing without my salary and housing stipend," he shares, highlighting the immediate financial and emotional impact on his family [21:23].

C. Emotional and Professional Response

Rodriguez expresses deep frustration and a strong commitment to continue his service despite the challenges.

• Emotional Toll:
  "That statement makes me feel really mad, sad... it's an actual betrayal of every principle that I've sworn to defend," Rodriguez states at [23:54].

• Commitment to Service:
  He emphasizes his dedication to uphold the Constitution and serve until retirement, rejecting the notion that his service is anything less than honorable [23:21].

• Policy Critique:
  Rodriguez criticizes the policy as undermining military cohesion and readiness, arguing that it distracts from training and deployment efforts [16:10].

D. Conclusion of Personal Narrative

Rodriguez concludes by reaffirming his identity and commitment, asserting that his role as a mental health provider is crucial for supporting fellow service members.

• Identity Affirmation:
  "I identify as transmasculine non binary... I'm just being a person and the transmasculine simply just correlates to I am masculine presenting and I have or I take testosterone," Rodriguez clarifies [20:59].

• Future Uncertainty:
  Faced with potential separation, Rodriguez grapples with uncertainty about his future, including employment, housing, and family stability [21:19].

---

3. Community and Broader Implications

The episode contextualizes Rodriguez's experience within the broader framework of military policy changes and societal attitudes towards transgender individuals.

• Policy Volatility:
  Rodriguez highlights the instability caused by frequent policy reversals, which hinder the military's ability to maintain focus on its core mission [16:35].

• Societal Impact:
  "Trans and non binary people have become public enemy number one," Rodriguez asserts, underscoring the societal backlash and its repercussions on individual lives [12:10].

• Military Values vs. Policy:
  The narrative juxtaposes military values of honor, courage, and commitment with the Pentagon's policy, revealing a disconnect between personal service and institutional directives [23:21].

---

Conclusion

The March 5, 2025 episode of Today, Explained presents a comprehensive examination of the Pentagon's new policy mandating the separation of transgender service members. Through expert analysis and the poignant personal story of Sam Rodriguez, the podcast underscores the profound implications of such policies on individuals and the military as a whole. The episode invites listeners to reflect on the balance between institutional policies and the values of honor and commitment that define military service.

---

Notable Quotes:

• Noel King [02:40]:
  "Individuals who have a diagnosis or history of gender dysphoria are no longer eligible to serve as of today."

• Secretaries of Defense Pete Hegseth [00:32]:
  "Supporters... Americans saying, I want to serve under the Commander in Chief, President Trump."

• Petty Officer Sam Rodriguez [23:54]:
  "That statement makes me feel really mad, sad... it's an actual betrayal of every principle that I've sworn to defend."

• Sam Rodriguez reciting the Military Creed [26:07]:
  "I represent the fighting spirit of the Navy and those who have gone before me to defend freedom and democracy around the world."

---

For more detailed insights and discussions, listen to the full episode of Today, Explained on your preferred podcast platform.

Transcript

[Noel King]

President Trump addressed the Congress last night. You heard that, Uganda. But let's check in on Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, he tweeted from the car on his way to the address.

[Pete Hegseth]

It is an honor to be going.

[Noel King]

He tweeted. Again, a thank you after Trump mentioned him. Our service members won't be activists and ideologues. They will be fighters and warriors. They will fight for our country. And Pete, congratulations. Then he went on fox news this a.m. to discuss enlistment.

[Pete Hegseth]

From the Marine Corps to the army to the Air Force to the Navy, we've seen record numbers across the country of Americans saying, I want to serve under the Commander in Chief, President Trump.

[Noel King]

Neither Hegseth nor the president mentioned their plan to force transgender service members out of the military today. Unexplained. We're going to do that.

[Sam Rodriguez]

There are so many things that I would not have today if it wasn't for joining the military. I would regret not fighting to stay.

[Pete Hegseth]

Support for Today Explained comes from Attentive. Are you paying attention? How can you help your business stand out in the crowded world of SMS and email marketing? Well, Attentive wants to help. Attentive is the SMS and email marketing platform that was designed to help marketers transform every interaction into a personalized experience. Attentive's advanced AI adjusts each message's content, tone and timing to help marketers build and connect with the right audiences. If you want to take your customers on a journey created just for them, visit attentive.comtodayexplained to learn more.

[Haley Britsky]

Support for this show comes from ADT. From ADT comes Trusted Neighbor, the new standard in home access through the ADT plus app easily grant and automate event based or scheduled access for neighbors, friends and helpers. Notify trusted individuals of events like alarms or packages and set access windows for planned guests or even the dog walker without interrupting your day. Visit ADT.com when every second counts, count on ADT requires ADT Complete pro monitoring plan and compatible devices. Copyright 2025 ADT LLC. All rights reserved.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Foreign.

[Noel King]

This is today, explained Noel King here with Haley Britsky. Haley is CNN's Pentagon reporter and producer, and she's been following the DOD's plan to separate transgender service members from the military. Haley, what does this new Pentagon policy say exactly?

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Individuals who have a diagnosis or history of gender dysphoria are no longer eligible to serve as of today.

[Noel King]

It will henceforth be the policy of the United States government that there are only two genders, male and female.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

All service members will identify as only either male or female, which the policy says is unchangeable during a person's life. And it says their pronouns must reflect that. And it also disqualifies the use of DoD funds for medical procedures and things like hormone therapy and other procedures related to gender transition and things like that. It lays out exceptions for individuals currently serving in the military who will be separated under this policy. You know, it'll be a case by case basis of if a service member is kept in the military despite having a history or a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, if there is a, quote, government interest in keeping them in uniform because they directly support what they say is war fighting capabilities. It also says that they, you know, there are other exceptions, and if they have 36 months of what they say, stability in their sex and can demonstrate they've never attempted to transition and that they can adhere to the standards laid out in the military. So they lay out a few exceptions for people. It's kind of unclear how many people will fall into that category. And especially when we talk about war fighting capabilities, well, what does that actually mean? How will commanders view that or define that within this process? All of that is still kind of in a gray area at this point, as we haven't really started separating people quite yet.

[Noel King]

Do we know how many people this will affect?

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

We heard last week a senior defense official told reporters that there were a little over 4,000 troops who'd been diagnosed with gender dysphoria across all three components. So that's active duty military, National Guard, and the Reserve. You know, important to note that not all transgender people have a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria. So it's kind of unclear how many people. At the end of the day, this is really going to impact between 2014 and 2025, roughly 1,000 individuals in the military gender affirming surgery. So that's sort of what we're waiting to see is okay in practice. How many people will be impacted by this and ultimately how many would be eligible for waivers or even want to seek a waiver?

[Noel King]

President Trump and Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of defense, have they come out and said why they think people who are trans are unfit to serve their country?

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

So a lot of times what we hear is that this is tied to their deployability.

[Pete Hegseth]

Being transgendered in the military causes complications.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

And differences, meaning that, you know, if an individual is undergoing a medical procedure, they may be considered non deployable for so much time. That also is the case for pregnancy or for specific injuries or bone breaks. Things like that a non deployable status is not specifically tied to gender dysphoria or transgender individuals. So that's oftentimes one of the reasonings that they use. But what we see in the executive order and then in the Pentagon policy that resulted from it is they kind of go a step further than just focusing on the medical readiness of these individuals. They kind of hone in on their value system and morals by saying that individuals who have gender dysphoria or have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, that they are inconsistent with the honesty, humility and integrity that's required in the military in.

[Pete Hegseth]

Search of a non traditional constituency, they.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Offended their core constituency.

[Pete Hegseth]

So there aren't enough lesbians in San Francisco to man the 82nd Airborne. And in trying to cater to that, they lost the boys from Tennessee and Kentucky and Oklahoma, the traditional dudes who did it because they wanted, they loved their country or they wanted the adventure.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Or they wanted to try tough things, or it goes a step further than just saying medically you may not be able to serve, physically you may not be able to serve. It's saying that you do not align with our values of humility and integrity and honesty that is sort of has been made policy by existing in the Executive order and within this new policy memo from the Pentagon. But we haven't seen a lot of explanation of that point just yet.

[Noel King]

So the military is using the word separation, which is the word that it generally uses in cases like this, but it means people are losing their jobs. For people who are losing their jobs and didn't expect to lose their jobs, what are they receiving?

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

What the memo says is that if you elect to voluntarily separate within 30 days of that memo, you will get two times the separation pay. As if you wait to be involuntarily separated. And separation pay is, you know, it's kind of a complicated calculus, but it's essentially boils down to it's calculated on how long you've served in the military and what you were getting paid at the time of your separation. And so the Pentagon is saying, hey, if you are a transgender individual or an individual who's been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, if you know that you were going to be involuntarily separated under this policy, you can go ahead and start the process yourself. And by voluntarily separating, you'll get paid twice as much. And so we don't have a lot of answers as to, you know, when, how that will be calculated or what that will really look like in practice. Other Than it's clearly an incentive hoping to get individuals to start the process sooner rather than later of separating themselves from service.

[Noel King]

We are assuming there will be legal challenges, and we're in an environment where it's hard to tell what a legal challenge might lead to. But during President Trump's first term, as I recall, there were legal challenges to some of what he tried in the Pentagon.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

The ACLU of Maryland filed a lawsuit challenging the president's ban on transgender individuals in the military. They're asking for a preliminary injunction on the ban that was signed by President Trump over the summer after first announcing his intentions on Twitter.

[Noel King]

Can you take us back and tell us, as we start to see lawsuits and look for lawsuits, what we might be looking at here?

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Yeah. So there was legal challenging in 2017 to the ban that he issued then. I think it was at least four different lawsuits who were saying that this was a form of sex discrimination. The Supreme Court let that ban take effect just a couple of years later in 2019.

[Pete Hegseth]

The justices did not rule on the.

[Haley Britsky]

Merits of a lawsuit challenging the ban.

[Pete Hegseth]

But will allow it to move forward while lower courts work through it.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

So it did move forward in that sense. And then President Biden, when he took office, reversed it.

[Pete Hegseth]

And what I'm doing is enabling all qualified Americans to serve their country in uniform and essentially.

[Noel King]

Restoring the situation as.

[Pete Hegseth]

Existed before with transgender personnel, if qualified in every other way, can serve government.

[Sam Rodriguez]

In the United States military.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

That's what I'm about to sign. So this is essentially a reversal of a reversal of the original policy, saying that this is going to move forward. So, yeah, it's unclear where the legal status or where legally this memo or this policy can move forward. Given the new lawsuits against it, we may see it end up back in higher court. It's kind of unclear at this point, point where it's going to go, but it's certainly something that is playing out in the courts. And just as recently as this weekend, we saw more filings in which the Defense Department was given a Saturday deadline to answer some questions from the courts, which included things like how much money has the department spent on some of these procedures and how many people are included under this definition. Many of the questions they could not answer in the filings, saying that essentially they didn't have enough time to figure this out, that it would have taken a few more weeks than they were allowed. But it's still very actively being debated in court and certainly something that we're going to be continuing to follow.

[Noel King]

When do these separations have to be done by.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

What's the deadline here for those who are voluntarily separating? As I said, that's they have if they have 30 days to elect to voluntarily separate. Outside of that, the policy says that the service secretaries, so Secretary of the army of the Navy, Air Force, et cetera, that they need to begin establishing procedures to identify those troops within 30 days for separation and then begin separating them 30 days after that. So it sounds like roughly 60 days before separations will officially begin within the military services.

[Noel King]

That was Hailey Britsky. She covers the Pentagon for cnn. Coming up. So you've been serving honorably and now you're out. We're gonna hear what that's like.

[Sam Rodriguez]

I feel a lot of anger. I feel and not just anger because of a ban. I feel a lot of anger and disappointment. And at large, just, you know, trans and non binary people have become public enemy number one. And once you start taking away the rights of trans and non binary people, then the rest of the chips begin to fall.

[Pete Hegseth]

Support for Today Explained comes from Shopify. I think you might have to be a little bit crazy to start your own business, as they say, or maybe just delusional because the amount of work required to start and grow your own company is so wild no one in their right mind would take it on. Luckily, there are supportive partners out there that can take some of that work off your place. Guess who's one of them? If you want to add an essential member to your team, a platform you and your customers can rely on, you might want to check out Shopify. Want to upgrade your business and get the same checkout Mattel uses? You can sign up for your $1 per month trial [e-mail] explained. That's shopify.com explained. To upgrade your selling today, shopify.com explained Mattel. You guys also Heinz. They both turned to Shopify to sell more products to more customers. Businesses that sell more sell with Shopify.

[Haley Britsky]

Support for this show comes from adt. From ADT comes Trusted Neighbor, the new standard in home access through the ADT plus app. Easily grant and automate event based or scheduled access for neighbors, friends and helpers. Notify trusted individuals of events like alarms or packages and set access windows for planned guests or even the dog walker. Without interrupting your day, visit ADT.com when every second counts. Count on ADT requires ADT Complete Pro monitoring plan and compatible devices. Copyright 2025 ADT LLC. All rights reserved.

[Noel King]

Suppose in the future there is an artificial intelligence.

[Sam Rodriguez]

I've been asking some very smart people.

[Noel King]

A question that's been on a lot of our minds. Should we be worried about artificial intelligence? But the answers I got from the greatest minds in AI surprised me.

[Sam Rodriguez]

One guy told a parable of an.

[Noel King]

AI that could cause an apocalypse. Let's give this super intelligent AI a simple produce paperclips.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

The paperclip.

[Noel King]

Another woman cast AI as an octopus. We posit this octopus to be mischievous as well. And yet another story sounded like it.

[Sam Rodriguez]

Was out of the Bible.

[Noel King]

She seems likely to drown.

[Haley Britsky]

What should you do?

[Noel King]

Imagining AI as a savior.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Like a God?

[Noel King]

Kind of.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Yeah, like a.

[Noel King]

And all of these fantastical tales from the greatest minds in AI made me wonder. Maybe even these people don't know what to think. I'm Julia Longoria. Good Robot, a series about AI coming.

[Sam Rodriguez]

March 12th on unexplainable.

[Noel King]

Wherever you get podcasts today Explained is back. So this is kind of a universal experience. Your job changes a policy that affects you, and it is terrible because change is very hard for most of us. This doesn't happen all that often. But Navy Petty Officer Sam Rodriguez's military service has been upended again and again, again and again by policy changes. Sam joined the Navy in 2015. In 2016, a ban on transgender service members was lifted. Then Donald Trump was elected. And in 2017, Trump banned transgender service members. In 2020, Joe Biden was elected. Biden reversed the ban. And then in 2024, President Trump was elected and his DOD is now firing trans service members.

[Sam Rodriguez]

Yes, constant changing of the policies, it definitely creates distractions and also an instability, you know, not just for me, but for our leadership, too, and for the rest of the military. Right. Because the yo yoing of policy can make it challenging for people to know what is the most up to date. And so when we need to be concentrating on training and deployment, we're often left just like, navigating this unnecessary uncertainty. And that's what's really, you know, that's what's weakening our forced cohesion and readiness. It's not the fact that I'm in uniform, because if I wasn't meeting the standards, I would have already lost my job. People get separated from the military for all sorts of reasons all the time. I had actually wanted to join since high school, but I also didn't want to join during don't Ask, don't tell. I was in a family that wasn't very supportive of me as a young queer person. And so then thinking of joining an institution that wasn't going to be supportive didn't seem ideal. Even though being A part of something bigger than me did. When I ultimately decided to enlist in 2015, it was because I still very much felt this desire to join the military. And I wanted to be a mental health provider. I wanted to serve the people within the military. You know, people that joined the military, they take an oath to uphold the constitution and to protect the American people. And we also have to take care of them if we're expecting them to then fight for our rights. And so for me, it was serving my country through the service that I give back to the other service members as a mental health provider. Being in the military, it's a multi layered system with multi layers of stress, especially if you're in an operational command and you have a family. So your obligation and work tempo is going to be high. And then you also have to go home and take care of your family and you need to be able to find time to take care of yourself. And so I would argue that we still don't have enough mental health care providers in the military and that we need to do a better job at taking care of the whole service member. Again, if we're going to continue to ask them to do these very hard things and give up time with their family and essentially put their life on the line, then we also have to make sure that we're taking care of them. My place in supporting the mission is supporting the people. So I identify as transmasculine non binary. So my gender is non binary. I don't align with being a woman or with a man. I identify as just being a person and the transmasculine simply just correlates to I am masculine presenting and I have or I take testosterone. Most outsiders, if they don't know me, they're just going to assume I'm some CIS white dude, especially if you see me with my wife and kids. When I first started receiving gender affirming care, I was, I was working in an, at a command that was very supportive of me and I had colleagues that were very supportive of me. I had around almost 18 months on hormones. I did switch commands. So I returned back to sea, which in the Navy, that means that you return back to a deployable command or a command that will deploy. And it was a very small command and I was the first person, the first trans person that any of, of any of the people that worked there had ever interacted with or worked with. So there was definitely a lot of growing pains during that three and a half years. And honestly, there were times where I felt like many of My colleagues never respected my identity. They likely still just saw me as like, like a butch lesbian. But after I left that command and I got to the command that I'm at now, up until, up until recently, no one knew any differently. You know, I showed up there and have been assumed male. And unless I feel comfortable or safe to tell someone, they don't know any different. They don't know that I'm transferring.

[Noel King]

How is this new policy going to affect you? What does it mean for your career?

[Sam Rodriguez]

I was selected for a clinical fellowship that I'm supposed to start this year. So that was to be a two year intensive clinical fellowship, to be a clinical social worker within the Navy. So if I were to be separated based on my identity alone, then I am left trying to figure out where I'm going to work next, where my family's going to live, where we're going to get insurance. I have a wife, I have two kids, I have bills to pay. So it definitely, it's going. It's already creating a lot of disorientation of what am I going to do next, where am I going to go? Where are we going to live? We can't afford to live in our housing without my salary and housing stipend. So essentially we will be homeless unless we're able to find something that will support us on the one income. You know, I still have to find employment. And so having. Looking for employment and where that's going to be, we know that we won't stay here in San Diego. And so then identifying a place to relocate where hopefully we have a support network there.

[Noel King]

The Department of Defense is offering some terms for people who voluntarily leave the military in 30 days. We learned that in the first half of the show. Would you ever volunteer to go?

[Sam Rodriguez]

No, I would not.

[Noel King]

Why not?

[Sam Rodriguez]

Because I want to stay. Because I want to continue to do my job. I want to finish my 20 years. I don't want to voluntarily say, oh, yep, I'll take this ticket out of here. Because you're essentially saying that my nine years of honorable service means nothing and I'm not going to let you have that.

[Noel King]

I'm hearing you say you wanted to and you plan to stay in the military until retirement.

[Sam Rodriguez]

Yes, that was the goal.

[Noel King]

The Department of Defense has said that being trans is contrary to the. And here I'm going to quote Sam. High standards for service member readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity and integrity. You've been in the service since 2015. You know what this is driving at here. Let me ask you how you respond to that statement.

[Sam Rodriguez]

That statement makes me feel really mad, sad. Everything. Right. Because our nation is built on the values of freedom and service and sacrifice. My core values in the Navy are honor, courage and commitment. And I have given nine years of honorable service with honor, courage and commitment and integrity. I've never once received a counseling. I've never been to a disciplinary board. I have various personal awards and awards that I received at units to include the ranks and the positions that I've held. And so for you to just say that I am not adhering to all of those standards is an actual betrayal of every principle that I've sworn to defend. Because I do show up and I do continue to fight for the American people and also for the right to remain in service. And so it just. I don't believe that my service is not worthy or honorable. But for it to be. For that to be the narrative that they're spinning when all of us have served honorably. Because if we weren't, if we weren't doing all of those things already, if we weren't meeting the standards, we would have already lost our job. Again, most people are. People leave service all the time for all sorts of reasons. And if we weren't meeting the standards, they would have already given us our walking papers. Not because we're transgender or non binary, but because we weren't meeting the standards to uphold the missions within the military.

[Noel King]

Listener, did you know that every branch of the US Military has a creed? It must be memorized and sometimes quickly recalled. Petty Officer 2nd Class Sam Rodriguez can recite it without a hitch.

[Sam Rodriguez]

I am United States sailor. I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. And I will obey the orders of those appointed over me. I represent the fighting spirit of the Navy and those who have gone before me to defend freedom and democracy around the world. I proudly serve my country's Navy combat team with honor, courage and commitment. I am committed to excellence and the fair treatment of all.

[Noel King]

Victoria Chamberlain produced today's show. Aminah El Saadi edited Patrick Boyd and Andre Christin's daughter engineered and Laura Bullard check the film facts. I'm Noel King. It's Today Explained.

[Haley Britsky]

Support for this show comes from adt. From ADT comes Trusted Neighbor, the new standard in home access through the ADT plus app. Easily grant and automate event based or scheduled access for neighbors, friends and helpers. Notify trusted individuals of events like alarms or packages and set access windows for planned guests or even the dog walker without interrupting your day. Visit ADT.com when every second counts, count on. ADT requires ADT complete pro monitoring plan and compatible devices. Copyright 2025 ADT, LLC. All rights reserved.

[Pete Hegseth]

All right, Sean, you can do this promo. Talking about all the great Vox Media podcasts that are going to be on stage live at south by Southwest this March. You just need a big idea to get people's attention, to help them, you know, keep them from hitting the skip button. I don't know. I'm gonna throw it out to the group.

[Noel King]

Chat.

[Pete Hegseth]

Kara, do you have any ideas?

[Noel King]

In these challenging times, we're a group of mighty hosts who have banded together to fight disinformation by speaking truth to power. Like the Avengers, but with more spandex. What do you think, Scott?

[Sam Rodriguez]

I'm more of an X Men fan myself. Call me Professor. Can I read minds?

[Pete Hegseth]

I can't really read minds, but I.

[Sam Rodriguez]

Can empathize with anyone having a midlife crisis, which is essentially any tech leader. So minds are important, Scott, but we're more than that.

[Noel King]

I think that you can't really separate minds from feelings.

[Sam Rodriguez]

And we need to talk about our.

[Pete Hegseth]

Emotions and explore the layers of our relationships with our partners, coworkers, our families.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Neighbors, and our adjacent communities.

[Noel King]

I just want to add a touch more. From sports and culture to tech and politics, Vox Media has an all star lineup of podcasts that's great in your.

[Unnamed Pentagon Official]

Feeds, but even better live.

[Pete Hegseth]

That's it. All Stars. Get your game on. Go play. Come see a bunch of Vox Media All Stars stars and also me at south by Southwest on the Vox Media podcast stage, presented by Smartsheet and Intuit. March 8th through 10th in Austin, Texas. Go to VoxMedia.com SXSW you'll never know if you don't go. You'll never shine if you don't glow.