President Donald Trump and Secretary of Protection Pete Hegseth are shoving ahead on their mission to whitewash and man-ify the U.S. army.
The division’s high public affairs official despatched out a memo Wednesday instructing workplaces to comb by their web sites and front-facing social media accounts for any trace of “diversity, equity, and inclusion.”
Within the memo, obtained by the Related Press, the departments are given a March 5 deadline. If they’ll’t oblige, then they have to “temporarily remove from public display” all content material revealed below former President Joe Biden’s administration.
“Given the intense focus on recent changes within the department, maintaining the public trust is more important than ever,” learn the memo, which was signed by Darin Selnick, the non permanent undersecretary for personnel.
Talking to AP below the situation of anonymity, officers stated they got a matter of days to evaluation and scrub on-line materials “on gains in the military by women and minorities or stories celebrating cultural heritage,” the outlet wrote.
Because of the mounting strain and lack of time, they had been instructed at occasions to delete each single put up from Biden’s time period.
“Was it because of his skin color? Or his skill?” Hegseth wrote in his 2024 book, “The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free.”
President Donald Trump
“We’ll never know, but always doubt—which on its face seems unfair to CQ. But since he has made the race card one of his biggest calling cards, it doesn’t really much matter,” he added.
In one other transfer to whitewash the army, Hegseth introduced it could now not use federal assets to have a good time issues resembling Black Historical past Month, Ladies’s Historical past Month, Pleasure Month, Nationwide Hispanic Heritage Month, Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, Nationwide American Indian Heritage Month, and Nationwide Incapacity Employment Consciousness Month.
“We are proud of our warriors and their history, but we will focus on the character of their service instead of their immutable characteristics,” the steering says.
Along with the army’s assault on range and any type of id, the Pentagon is transferring to push out present and future transgender army folks inside 30 days.
Based on the coverage memo, obtained by Axios, the Pentagon will think about granting waivers on a “case-by-case basis” however provided that there’s “a compelling authorities curiosity in retaining the service member that immediately helps warfighting capabilities.”
The transfer is in response to a brand new lawsuit filed on behalf of six transgender army members who’ve collectively served for many years.
One member, Sergeant First Class Kate Cole, has served for almost 17 years and has been awarded 5 Military Commendation Medals. She has additionally been positioned within the high 10% of all Armor Department Sergeants First Class within the Military’s Order of Benefit Listing.
Nevertheless, below Trump’s govt order, she is deemed unfit to serve.
Different lawsuits have hit Trump’s desk for the reason that convicted felon sought to ban transgender folks from the army.
Lambda Authorized and the Human Rights Marketing campaign instantly equipped for (authorized) conflict when Trump’s govt order was signed.
In a press release to Day by day Kos, Sasha Buchert, Lambda Authorized’s director of the nonbinary and transgender rights mission, defined why this transfer is so dangerous to the transgender group and to the army as a complete.
“[The executive order] will hurt readiness as a result of it is going to take away servicemembers that the army has invested hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in coaching,” she told Daily Kos. “Thousands of transgender troops are combat-tested, having been deployed to war zones and executed missions with distinction, many of whom are senior personnel with decades of experience. It will hurt unit cohesion because it will discriminate against otherwise qualified service members, sending the message that identity rather than merit is what is important and that some discrimination is acceptable.”
As Trump and Hegseth demand that workplaces wipe the army’s numerous historical past from its on-line presence, one factor is for certain: They’ll’t delete what shops are reporting on them. And historical past will all the time do not forget that.
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