San Diego veterans join chorus demanding a repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell

Opponents of the military’s ban on openly gay and lesbian service members increased calls this week to repeal the 16-year-old law referred to as “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.”

During a Thomas Jefferson School of Law panel Tuesday — on the eve of Veterans Day — 23-year-old Navy veteran Joseph Rocha called the military’s policy an “open invitation” to abuse service members, regardless of gender and sexual orientation.

Rocha, a student at the University of San Diego, suffered more than two years of taunts, hazing and abuse in the U.S. Navy, before admitting to his commander he was gay.

Rocha was honorably discharged, and a subsequent investigation found more than 93 counts of abuse against Rocha and several sailors, and 27 violations of military code of conduct by Chief Petty Officer Michael Toussaint.

“The abuse never would have continued or reached the levels that it did, had I simply been able to go to (the) Equal Opportunity (office) and say, ‘I am a gay man being abused specifically because of my homosexuality,’” he said.

Rocha says during his time with a bomb-sniffing K9 unit in Bahrain, he was tied to a chair and left in dog kennels, hosed down in full uniform and forced to simulate oral sex on another sailor.

Rocha said the unit’s second-in-command — Petty Officer 1st Class Jennifer Valdivia — was a victim too, but when Toussaint was promoted, Valdivia was put in charge of the unit and faced disciplinary action for failing to stop the abuse. She committed suicide on Jan. 12, 2007.

Rocha said he and others will send a letter this week to Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, asking for a court martial of Toussaint, and a full report on Valdivia’s suicide. Rocha said he and others will also ask how many high-ranking officers had knowledge of the abuse, and how the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy facilitated it.

Rocha joins a chorus of advocacy organizations, veterans and elected officials, who are urging for the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.

The Palm Center, a pro-gay rights think tank at the University of California Santa Barbara, released a report Monday that claims unit cohesion is not impacted by openly gay or lesbian service members.

Supporters of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell have long said allowing gay military personnel to serve openly would affect troop morale and military readiness. Rocha called that the “loudest claim.”

“This is the strongest evidence yet that homosexuality has no effect on military service,” said Dr. Nathaniel Frank, author of “Unfriendly Fire: How the Gay Ban Undermines the Military and Weakens America” and a senior research fellow at the Palm Center, which commissioned the study.

The study — authored by Bonnie Moradi of the University of Florida and Laura Miller of the nonprofit Rand Corporation — analyzed war veterans’ ratings of unit cohesion and readiness, and found that knowing a gay or lesbian unit member was not statistically correlated with either cohesion or readiness.

According to the study, “the data indicated no associations between knowing a lesbian or gay unit member and ratings of perceived unit cohesion or readiness. Instead, findings pointed to the importance of leadership and instrumental quality in shaping perceptions of unit cohesion and readiness.”

But, the study also reported 40 percent of returning war troops support the current military policy, 28 percent are opposed to it and 32 percent are neutral.

In terms of strategy, opponents of the policy are considering different paths toward the repeal.

According to the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN), the Military Readiness Enhancement Act (HR-1283) would repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, and replace it with a policy prohibiting discrimination in the armed forces on the basis of sexual orientation. The bill has 183 cosponsors, and needs 215 to pass Congress.

Opponents of the military’s policy have also considered attaching a repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell to a military spending bill, which may garner the support of some Republican representatives. The maneuver isn’t unusual. Last month, the president signed federal hate crimes legislation that was attached to a military spending bill.

Gay Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) told the Washington Blade this week the repeal would likely be a part of a Defense Department spending bill Congress will consider early next year.

Frank and a spokesperson for the Human Rights Campaign said the repeal “belongs” with the authorization bill, and that is “where it should be.”

Rocha said Tuesday the fight to repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell “probably cannot be won on a gay rights issue alone.”

“There are just too many people who fundamentally won’t care,” he said. ” … If you can’t get people to care on a civil rights issue, then there’s a good chance you can get a large demographic of people to care on the economic issue. They are personally impacted by the economic crisis, and when you tell them it costs $363 million to implement or keep the policy, they’re not going to be in favor of that. … You have another demographic touched by national security issues due to their own service or their families,  and you tell them you lose 14,000 service members under this policy, and that’s where you get them.”

Locals — Rocha included — are hopeful they will see an end to Don’t Ask Don’t Tell soon.

Ben Gomez, a Navy veteran and president of the local chapter of American Veterans for Equal Rights (AVER) marched in Washington D.C. last month with thousands of gay rights activists, in part, to prompt the president to reiterate his support of the gay community, and his pledge to repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.

“Where we are in terms of our cosponsors, the dialogue in D.C., and this new administration, I am more positive, and hopeful than ever a repeal is imminent,” Gomez said.

Joseph Peña is SDNN’s Lifestyle editor. E-mail: joseph.pena(at)sdnn.com.

Tags: Ben Gomez American Veterans for Equal Rights, Bonnie Moradi of the University of Florida, Chief Petty Officer Michael Toussaint, Don't Ask Don't Tell Defense Department spending, Don't Ask Don't Tell gay service members, Don't Ask Don't Tell Joseph Rocha, Don't Ask Don't Tell Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, Don't Ask Don't Tell Veterans Day, Dr. Nathaniel Frank, Joseph Rocha Navy veteran, Laura Miller Rand Corporation, Military Readiness Enhancement Act HR 1283, Petty Officer 1st class Jennifer Valdivia, Rep. Barney Frank, SDNN, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, SLDN, The Palm Center Don't Ask Don't Tell, The Palm Center UCSB, Unfriendly Fire: How the Gay Ban Undermines the Military and Weakens America

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