Rick Scott just talked about “transgender training” in the military and we’re all a little dumber now

Sen. Rick Scott of Florida has identified the greatest threat to the U.S. military. No, it’s not Russia. It’s not China. It’s “wokeness,” “pronouns,” and “transgender training.”

In a March 17 interview on the 92.3 FM radio show Pensacola Morning News, show host Andrew McKay asked Scott about the military’s readiness to engage in a possible conflict.

“They’re more focused on woke stuff than they are on being lethal,” Scott replied. “I think our job of our military — and I served in the Navy, my dad served in the Army — our job is basically to scare the crap out of our enemies. They’re putting a lot of time into pronouns, stuff like that.”

Scott said a Naval commander told him that military heads ordered the commander to stop tracking a Chinese ship in order to “do transgender training.” The military has no record of such a thing ever occurring, a Pentagon spokesperson told the American Independent Foundation (API).

Nevertheless, Scott blamed President Joe Biden, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Mark Milley of becoming “woke” and focusing more “on gender and skin color than on having a lethal military force,” the API wrote.

It’s not surprising that Scott is targeting “wokeness” and trans-inclusivity in the military. Republican politicians now blame “wokeness” for any policy or social change they dislike. Heck, some even blamed wokeness for causing a 2022 school shooting and for causing a multi-billion dollar bank to collapse in early March.

In particular, Republicans have blasted Biden for “woke” policies, including requiring military service members to get vaccinated against COVID-19 — a policy that was actually put into place during the administration of President Donald Trump (R) — repealing Trump’s ban on transgender soldiers and anti-racist training to help discourage white supremacy within the ranks.

Republicans nationwide have blamed trans-inclusivity for “mutilating” children, turning kids trans through “gender ideology,” and causing public school students to identify as cats and demand litter boxes as bathrooms (something that has 100% never actually occurred, but continues to be spread by right-wingers nonetheless).

Rick Scott in particular has his own anti-LGBTQ+ history. While serving as Florida’s governor, after the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting, he refused even to say the words “gay” and “LGBT” when speaking about the massacre. He fought to preserve Florida’s ban on same-sex marriage, too.

Gov. Scott signed a repeal of a law barring same-sex couples from adopting children. That sounds great, but while doing so, he also asked his state’s legislature to pass a law allowing adoption agencies to discriminate against same-sex couples, The Tallahassee Democrat noted.

During his time as governor, he also refused $70 million in federal money to fight HIV/AIDS. At the time, Florida had the most new cases of HIV in the entire country.

It could just be that the 70-year-old legislator remembers the U.S. military very differently. When he served in the military in 1970, LGBTQ+ people weren’t allowed to serve openly. In fact, they were seen as a security threat because foreign operatives could blackmail them, threatening to out them in exchange for classified military intelligence.

But it’s 2023 now, and if Scott still considers queer people a threat to the military, it could just be that the military has moved on past his outdated style of thinking.