Supreme Court rules that Trump's ban on transgender troops can go into effect; CNN calls the ruling 'extreme'

The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that the Trump administration's ban on transgender troops in the military can go into effect until lower courts issue a ruling on whether or not the ban is constitutional. CNN described this ruling as "extreme."

Though the high court lifted a temporary injunction on the ban, it did not issue a ruling on the case itself.

Here's what we know

In March, the White House issued a statement announcing that transgender people would be banned from military service on the basis that they presented a "considerable risk to military effectiveness and lethality." That policy reversed an Obama-era policy that had allowed openly transgendered people to serve in the military.

In April, a federal judge ruled against the ban and upheld a preliminary injunction preventing President Donald Trump's order from taking effect. The injunction had been issued in December 2017, a few months after Trump had announced on Twitter that he would be banning anyone who identified as transgender from being able to "serve in any capacity in the U.S. military."

Chief Justice John Roberts voted Tuesday with conservative justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh in favor of lifting the injunction and allowing the policy to go into effect, while liberal justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan voted against lifting the injunction.

However, the court did not take up the case itself. Lower courts will still decide the long-term future of the ban. The only thing the Supreme Court decided on Tuesday was that the ban could go into effect until such a time, if ever, that the lower courts ruled against it.

What did CNN say about it?

During its coverage of the decision, CNN correspondent Jessica Schneider said that the Supreme Court was "taking a pretty extreme step here" since the decision could stand for months or even potentially years while lower courts debated the case. "And yes, it will have consequences within the military," she added.