Skip to content

Jo Ellis and transgender people

Jo Ellis is an American former military pilot, podcaster, and aspiring professional comedian. In 2025, Ellis and Laura Targownik launched the conservative trans podcast TransNormal. 

Background

Jo Ellis grew up in a conservative religious household. Ellis’ parent worked for televangelist Pat Robertson.

Ellis served in the US military for 16 years. Ellis was a chief warrant officer, a Black Hawk pilot in the Virginia Army National Guard. In 2023, Ellis made a gender transition while serving. In 2024, Ellis came out to unit members. In January 2025, Ellis came out publicly in an essay on Smerconish.

Following a January 29, 2025 midair crash involving a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter and a commercial American Airlines jet near Reagan National Airport, some right-wing social media accounts claimed Ellis was the helicopter pilot. Ellis later sued for defamation.

In 2025, the Trump Administration ordered that Ellis be discharged from the military for being transgender.

Eliis has been married with a stepchild. During a 2025 stand-up set, Ellis described dates and hookups with women and men since transitioning.

Views on trans topics

In April 2025, Ellis posted on X in part:

There are two sexes: male and female.

There are physical variations to this known as intersex. There are also brain variations to this. Some males and females develop a persistent discomfort with their sex and it’s often accompanied by a desire to live as the opposite sex. We don’t know what causes this condition, but early evidence suggests it’s something that occurs in the brain, likely during development in the womb, and is present at birth. Some have called this “brain gender” or “intersex solely of the brain”. It might not be recognized or understood by those affected for years.

[…] Trans women generally have an advantage in women’s sports. It’s not understood if the advantage exists in all sports, at all ages, and it’s not entirely understood if the advantages can be mitigated to some sort of parity based on puberty experienced or length of time on cross-sex hormones.

[…] There are some in the medical field that have started prescribing medical transition (hormones, puberty blockers, and surgery) to children under 18. This combined with the rise of the smartphones, social media, and general degradation of mental health in young teens has caused misdiagnosis and medical harm disproportionately to young girls, but also some young boys.

[…] Care and support must be provided to anyone who detransitions and their cases should be reviewed and studied to reduce this outcome.

In 2025, Ellis and Laura Targownik launched the conservative trans podcast TransNormal. Ellis also started the solo podcast The Jo Ellis Effect.

Comedy

In July 2025, Ellis did a one-minute self-deprecating set on Kill Tony as part of a goal to do stand-up full time, with hopes of doing an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience. Ellis told two prepared jokes:

  • “I’m not sure if you can tell that I was trans. I’m always self-conscious about my voice. I figured it’d give me away. But the men I’ve been with lately actually said it was my dick.”
  • [on getting doxxed during the midair crash rumors] “They found out I am converting to Judaism, and so trans and Jewish. If you haven’t noticed, my hobby lately is collecting identities that people hate.”

Hinchcliffe and the panel then spoke with Ellis for over ten minutes, during which Ellis answered several deeply personal questions. They covered topics like transitioning in the military, being banned from military service (Ellis joked that the military said, “Hey, you’re a tranny, you’re getting fucking kicked out”), vaginoplasty (“I sill kind of have like a guy brain, so I shop for it like I’m shopping for cars on Facebook marketplace”), and Ellis’ military service duties. Hinchcliffe asked if being on hormones initially made Ellis “more emotional” while serving:

  • Ellis: “At first, but then I got stable on them in a few months, and then I was good to go.”
  • Hinchcliffe: “So you were in the military for a few months on medicine feeling kind of unstable.”
  • Ellis: “Not unstable, no. Just emotional. So I was grounded from flying during that time, then put back into service afterwards. I was deployable within six weeks.”

The conversation ended with Hinchcliffe saying “I like your style,” and giving Ellis a big joke book, a sign of approval. Hinchcliffe did not give Ellis a golden ticket, the biggest prize which allows comedians to skip the sign-up process in the future.

In August 2025, comedian Marc Maron said of the Austin comedy scene centered around Rogan, “Whatever they represented, in terms of policy, it’s like, they won. Trans people are frightened. They have no ability to get health care anymore, and they’re afraid of being alive and have no freedom left. That’s done, When do you stop with the jokes? Like immigrants, they’re being ripped away from their homes, and they’re all terrified. It’s one thing to pick on the vulnerable and the marginalized, but, I mean, they’re down. Why do you got to keep hitting them? Unless you’re a hack. Now there’s a question.”

Ellis defended Hinchcliffe and the Austin comedy scene, adding on X: “Marc Maron rather complain about trans jokes while also never having a trans comedian on his podcast. Meanwhile many trans comedians (including me) have been on Kill Tony… who’s more inclusive?” (Maron did have comedian Mae Martin as a guest in 2024.)

Ellis later explained, “I jokingly called the first Kill Tony attempt Operation Conservative PsyOp. And the idea for that was to go down and do standup comedy as a tool for– as an avenue to reach people that I’m not able to reach as a trans person and as someone getting kicked out of the military.” Ellis got bookings following the appearance and made another trip to Austin in summer 2025.

References

Hankinson, Andrew (October 3, 2025). Laughing in Joe Rogan land. The Observer https://observer.co.uk/style/features/article/laughing-in-joe-rogan-land

Winkie, Luke (August 7, 2025). The Cult of Kill Tony. Slate https://slate.com/culture/2025/08/kill-tony-hinchcliffe-austin-texas-comedy-trump.html

Bansal Varsha (July 2, 2025). A Trans Pilot Was Falsely Blamed for a Plane Crash. Now She’s Fighting the Right-Wing Disinfo Machine. Wired https://www.wired.com/story/a-trans-pilot-was-falsely-blamed-for-a-plane-crash-now-shes-fighting-the-right-wing-disinfo-machine/

Phillipps, Dave (June 6, 2025). Some Trans Troops, Facing a Deadline, Opt to Stay and Fight the Ban. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/06/us/transgender-troops-ban-discharge-deadline.html

Walsh, Steve (June 5, 2025). A pilot vows not to go quietly as deadline for transgender military troops approaches. NPR https://www.npr.org/2025/06/05/nx-s1-5413379/a-pilot-vows-not-to-go-quietly-as-deadline-for-transgender-military-troops-approaches

Kane, Patricia (April 18, 2025). Virginia National Guard Pilot Wrongly Identified as Involved in DC Midair Collision Sues for Defamation. Military.com https://www.military.com/daily-news/2025/04/18/virginia-national-guard-pilot-wrongly-identified-involved-dc-midair-collision-sues-defamation.html

Crowley, Kinsey (April 10, 2025). Transgender pilot sues influencer for making claims she flew Black Hawk in DC crash. USA Today https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/04/10/transgender-pilot-sues-influencer-over-dc-crash-rumors/83023109007/

Somasundaram, Praveena (April 10, 2025). Trans pilot sues right-wing influencer who falsely blamed her for DCA crash. The Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/04/10/transgender-pilot-matt-wallace-lawsuit-crash/

Thompson, Stuart A. (April 9, 2025). Pilot Sues Influencer on X in Latest Test of Defamation Law. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/09/technology/pilot-lawsuit-jo-ellis-matt-wallace.html

Leingang, Rachel (April 9, 2025). Trans woman falsely linked to DC plane crash sues influencer for defamation. The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/09/dc-place-crash-trans-pilot

Yurcaba, Jo (April 9, 2025). Trans pilot falsely blamed in Potomac plane crash sues conservative influencer. NBC News https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/trans-pilot-falsely-blamed-potomac-plane-crash-sues-conservative-influ-rcna200474

Phillipps, Dave (February 27, 2025). Meet the Trans Troops the Trump Administration Is Barring. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/27/us/transgender-military-ban-trump-hegseth.html

Leingang, Rachel (February 11, 2025). “I became collateral damage”: the trans pilot falsely targeted over Washington DC crash. The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/11/washington-dc-plane-crash-diversity-trans-jo-ellis

Yousef, Odette (February 4, 2025). Social media rumors that a trans pilot was in the DCA crash follow a familiar playbook. NPR https://www.npr.org/2025/02/04/nx-s1-5282088/social-media-rumors-that-a-trans-pilot-was-in-the-dca-crash-follow-a-familiar-playbook

Thompson, Stuart A. (January 31, 2025). Virginia Pilot Responds After She Is Falsely Targeted Over Black Hawk Crash. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/31/us/virginia-pilot-black-hawk-helicopter-crash.html

Rahman, Khaleda (January 31, 2025). Who is Jo Ellis? Trans Black Hawk Pilot Wrongly Named in DC Crash. Newsweek https://www.newsweek.com/washington-dc-plane-crash-jo-ellis-trans-helicopter-pilot-wrongly-named-2024149

Anti-trans coverage

Confessore, Nicholas (June 19, 2025). How the Transgender Rights Movement Bet on the Supreme Court and Lost. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/19/magazine/scotus-transgender-care-tennessee-skrmetti.html

Selected publications by Ellis

Ellis, Jo (January 28, 2025). Living to Serve, Living as Myself: A Transgender Service Member’s Perspective. Smerconish https://www.smerconish.com/exclusive-content/living-to-serve-living-as-myself-a-transgender-service-members-perspective/

Media

Kill Tony with Tony Hinchcliffe, Tim Butterly, Joe DeRosa, and Brian Redban (July 17, 2025). Trans Black Hawk Pilot – Jo Ellis – Kill Tony Debut. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WYC-flN8Nc

DarkHorse with Bret Weinstein and Jo Ellis (February 15, 2025). Trans Army Black Hawk Pilot, Jo Ellis on DarkHorse. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGCRjjuzAbs

Michael Smerconish and Jo Ellis (February 1, 2025). Hear from the trans National Guard pilot falsely accused of flying helicopter in fatal collision. CNN https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKL_HsSpoCA

Resources

Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)

X/Twitter (x.com)

Instagram (instagram.com)

YouTube (youtube.com)

Facebook (facebook.com)

Spotify (spotify.com)

Apple Podcasts (podcasts.apple.com)