Gov, Charlie Baker’s office says the Massachusetts National Guard will continue to support transgender members.

The guard will keep the most qualified people with no regard to race, gender, sexual orientation or gender identity, he said.

“The federal government policy towards transgender people serving in the military is shameful,” Baker said. “Anybody that wants to put on a uniform and put themselves in harm’s way to serve this nation and to defend and protect the liberty we all enjoy deserve our thanks, gratitude, and appreciation.”

Scarlett Johansson has faced a wave of criticism this week over a new interview in which she claimed, "I should be allowed to play any person, or any tree, or any animal." The star, who has faced past casting controversies, is speaking out — explaining her comments were taken out of context.

"I recognize that in reality, there is a wide spread discrepancy amongst my industry that favors Caucasian, cisgender actors and that not every actor has been given the same opportunities that I have been privileged to," Johansson said. Her response concerns a July 11 interview published in As If magazine.

In it, the "Avengers: Endgame" actress explained she believed she should be permitted to play any role, "because that is my job and the requirements of my job." She added that "there are a lot of social lines being drawn now" and "a lot of political correctness is being reflected in art." 

The comments reminded some of her previous high-profile casting scandals. Last July, she dropped out of the film "Rub & Tug" amid ongoing backlash for her plans to play the lead role of a transgender man. Transgender actors and advocates immediately criticized the production for not casting a trans actor in the role.

She also faced outrage for her role in the live-action 2017 remake of anime classic "Ghost in the Shell." Critics condemned the filmmakers and the studio, Paramount, for casting Johansson in a traditionally Japanese role as the character Motoko Kusanagi. While promoting the film, Johansson made it clear that she thought the allegations of whitewashing were unfounded.

Many took to social media to share their frustration with her statements. "Pose" star Indya Moore, who identifies as transgender and non-binary, tweeted, "Why Compare trans people and poc to trees and animals..." Twitter user @niceonefransi posted an image of a tree and joked, "OMG I can't believe I just met Scarlett Johansson!! what an honor!!!"

Johansson issued a statement Saturday amidst the wave of criticism, according to The Associated Press: "I personally feel that, in an ideal world, any actor should be able to play anybody and Art, in all forms, should be immune to political correctness."

She also claimed the comments were edited in other publications for "clickbait."

The House approved an amendment Thursday to the defense policy bill that would allow transgender individuals to serve openly again in the U.S. military.

The measure, sponsored by House Armed Services personnel subcommittee chair Rep. Jackie Speier, D-California, was inserted into the House's version of the National Defense Authorization bill, which the chamber is expected to vote on Friday.

Ten Republicans joined Speier and 241 other Democrats to support the amendment, which would allow those who meet gender-neutral military standards to serve, regardless of race, religion, national origin, sexual orientation or gender identity.

"Courageous transgender service members continue to fight for our country despite the president's hateful ban and deserve to know we stand with them," Speier said in arguing for the provision. "Our country has a shameful history of preventing people from serving based on bias, ignorance and malice."

Speaking against the amendment, Rep. Vicky Hartzler, R-Missouri, said she objects to it because it seems to let anyone serve if they meet military standards without taking into account any medical conditions now considered incompatible with military service.

Noting that the Defense Department changed the rule to bar potential recruits or troops with gender dysphoria -- the diagnosis for those who suffer anxiety or mental health issues as a result of the gender they were born with -- Hartzler said the "military is under no obligation to accept individuals who do not meet the medical criteria for service."

"Military service is a privilege. It is not a right. It would be unwise for us to make exceptions to service for one specific entity who could not meet medical standards," she said.

A policy went into effect earlier this year that bars persons or troops with a history or diagnosis of gender dysphoria from serving. Under the policy, those diagnosed with gender dysphoria or who have initiated treatment or swapped genders are no longer able to join the U.S. military, in most cases.

The fate of the House defense policy remains to be seen, with some progressive Democrats voicing their objections to the bill and Republicans universally opposing it. But with the Democrats' large majority, it is expected to pass.

The Senate has approved its own version of the legislation, but it contains few of the personnel policy provisions contained in the House version, including the transgender service measure; an effort to end the penalty military survivors pay when receiving posthumous checks from the Defense and Veterans Affairs Departments; and a provision that would allow the families of service members injured as a result of medical malpractice to sue the federal government.

“I decided to come to the U.S. to save my life,” says Luz, a transgender asylum seeker, in Sylvia Johnson’s short documentary Luz’s Story. In Honduras, Luz was shot multiple times by alleged gang members who targeted her for her trans identity. She barely emerged with her life. As soon as she was released from the hospital, she was transferred to a Honduran prison on charges of defending her identity. Upon her release 10 months later, after being abused in prison, several gang members again threatened her life.

Luz entered the United States via an official port of entry and asked for protection through political asylum. She was promptly imprisoned. “I had already been imprisoned [in Honduras] and didn’t want to experience another situation like what I had been through,” she says in the film.

Later, Luz would learn that her Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility, New Mexico’s Cibola County Correctional Center, had previously been a criminal correctional prison. In October 2016, it was shut down due to inhumane conditions that resulted in several inmate deaths. Shortly thereafter, ICE offered a contract of $30 million a year to the same facility. It reopened in January 2017. Since early 2018, Cibola has incarcerated more than 180 women in its “transgender pod”—the only known ICE-run detention facility for transgender-identifying women. According to Johnson, the incarcerated women, such as Luz, were seeking protection from violence and persecution they had suffered in their home country.

Luz says she spent three excruciating months in Cibola—two of which were in solitary confinement. “It was really, really horrible for me,” she says. “I went into a depression that made me want to hurt myself.”

Johnson, who works part-time at the Santa Fe Dreamers Project, told me that the women in the trans pod face extraordinary hardships and obstacles to winning their cases. “While in custody, they face a shocking lack of medical and mental-health services,” she said. “They are put in abusive solitary confinement, they experience high levels of sexual assault, and they face discrimination from the government and the corporation that detains them.” Johnson cited the deaths of Roxsana Hernandez Rodriguez in 2018 and Johana Medina Leon this year as grave evidence of ICE’s inability to detain trans women safely.

Luz’s Story, a collaboration between Johnson and the photographer Eduardo Montes-Bradley, is just one horrific account of the trauma experienced by many trans asylum seekers.

“I was completely blown away by the resilience of Luz’s spirit and how vivacious she is despite what she has gone through,” Johnson said. “Luz has been through things that no human being should ever have to experience, and she is warm, kind, full of life, and unafraid to speak her truth.”