Elementor #5039

 The decision to overturn Roe vs Wade will have devastating impacts on women and nonbinary service members and veterans. It will also significantly weaken our overall national defense, and damage military morale, readiness, recruiting and retention. It already has. See more here. This decision doesn’t only impact women and nonbinary service members, it impacts everyone in the military and veteran community and everything that we touch. And therefore, it impacts all Americans.

Immediate, non-partisan action must be taken now to minimize the harm, take care of our own, and plan for the future. As veterans and as citizens.

We are an experienced group of leaders from the military and veteran community and will fight for the following actions to protect ourselves, our service members and fellow veterans, and the future of the country we love.

This is what we recommend as a plan of action. This is what we are standing to fight for now:

1. For the active duty and reserve military, ensure immediate reproductive health care access for every single service member and family member connected to the Department of Defense.
Specifically, the DoD can and should take immediate action within its authority to protect to service members in the states that now have laws restricting access to abortion services.

2. For veterans, Department of Veterans Affairs must lift the ban on abortion services and counseling at the VA immediately.
Women and transgender veterans in all 50 states deserve equal and adequate access to the health care they’ve earned. The VA Secretary can and should exercise his current authority to make this happen immediately.

3. Codify Roe v Wade.
The right of every American woman to make decisions about her health care must be restored. Especially for those who have already put their life on the line for their country.

This list is by no means exhaustive. But these are the most urgent strategic priorities for our service-members and veterans. Some priorities may also potentially be achieved by executive, administrative, legal, and/or ballot measures. All options to accomplish them should be explored and exhausted by Congress, The President, The Department of Defense, The Department of Veterans Affairs, the courts, and the public.

UPDATE: We’ve already achieved one significant goal. In March, we led a truly historic victory–pushing the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to finally drop its exclusionary, male-only motto to be more gender-inclusive. As the Army Times noted, “The use of male-specific language in the original mission statement has long drawn criticism from veterans advocates who note that women veterans are the fastest growing cohort of the community, expected to make up one in every five living veterans in America by 2040.”

We stand with our troops and veterans. We stand with America. We stand with liberty.

Allison Jaslow, former Executive Director of Iraq & Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), Iraq Veteran

Amy McGrath, former US Senate candidate, Iraq and Afghanistan Veteran

Jeremy Butler, Navy Veteran

Paul Rieckhoff, Founder, Iraq & Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), Iraq Veteran