The Department of the Navy issued an apology letter Friday to former military personnel “unjustly removed” from service because of the COVID vaccine mandate during the Biden administration.
Under Secretary of the Navy Hung Caoemphasized that the Department of War is committed to “righting past wrongs” and welcoming back former service members who were dismissed during the pandemic.
“To the sailors and marines who were wrongfully discharged during COVID, we failed you,” Hung said in a video posted on X. “We will never allow this to happen again, not on my watch. We are ready for you to come back, and we want to correct your records.”
Cao, the Department of the Navy’s chief operating and chief management officer, overseeing roughly one million Navy, Marine Corps and civilian personnel, acknowledged the impact of the mandate on those it forced out.
“We are righting this wrong and it starts with this formal letter of apology,” he said.
President Trump signed Executive Order 14184 shortly after returning to office last January, directing federal agencies to identify service members affected by the former vaccine requirement and take steps to reinstate them or restore certain benefits.
The order applies to former members of the Army, Air Force, Marine Corps, Navy, Space Force and Coast Guard who were discharged solely for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine.
The former secretary of defense mandated in 2021 that all service members receive the COVID-19 vaccine, a policy that was rescinded in 2023.
“The military unjustly discharged those who refused the vaccine, regardless of the years of service given to our Nation, after failing to grant many of them an exemption that they should have received,” Trump’s executive order states.
The Department of War issued guidance to all the secretaries of military departments to contact former service members with information about potential reinstatement and to correct their discharge records.
According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, more than 8,000 service members were separated after the Biden administration’s Department of Defense issued the vaccination mandate.
“It is unconscionable that thousands of former Service members who held true to their personal and religious convictions were not just separated, but separated with general (under honorable conditions), rather than honorable, discharge characterizations,” Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said in a December memo. “While many have applied for and received relief from our Military Department review boards, I believe the onus is on us to make this right.”
Hegseth said he directed a proactive review of personnel records to identify individuals involuntarily discharged solely for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine and facilitate appropriate discharge upgrades.
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