Is DOJ Still Upholding Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell?

Full Title: Is DOJ Still Upholding Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell? A Painful Reminder That Gays Are Still Second Class Citizens
From LGBT POV

Tuesday, March 20 marked the 6th month anniversary of the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. To be sure, as former Marine Captain and longtime Servicemember Legal Defense Network board member Tom Carpenter noted, repeal was a “nonevent.” Even Stars and Stripes reported that “DADT died quietly.”

But the celebrations must be tempered with some hard facts: 1) the Justice Department is still arguing against the Log Cabin Republican legal team that won the ruling that DADT was unconstitutional; and 2) while President Obama lauds the repeal of DADT in his re-election speeches, he has not yet signed an executive order banning discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity in the military; and 3) because of the Defense of Marriage Act, the federal government is failing to provide health care and surviving spouse benefits, among other benefits, to out servicemembers. That most directly and painfully impacts Chief Warrant Officer 2 Charlie Morgan of the New Hampshire National Guard right now. Morgan came out on Thomas Roberts’ MSNBC show – but was apparently too ill with cancer to appear with him again on Tuesday to celebrate the repeal. Morgan is part of an SLDN lawsuit challenging DOMA.

In a statement commemorating the repeal, Army Veteran and SLDN Executive Director Aubrey Sarvis said:

“Even as we celebrate the success we have seen so far on ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ repeal, we know that implementation cannot be entirely successful as long as we have two classes of service members. It’s past time for the Secretary of Defense to act on this front, and at this six-month mark, it would be entirely appropriate to do so. The reality is that the Department of Defense started looking at benefits long before repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ took place, including in the findings of the Comprehensive Review Working Group…. We cannot be a nation with two classes of service members.” (For more on McLaughlin v. U.S. and the plaintiffs involved, click here.)