The opinions expressed by contributors are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of RedState.com.
One of the reasons my son separated from the Navy was because of nonsensical command decisions and political toadies more interested in climbing the career ladder than doing the right thing. He separated well before the pandemic hit and the Pentagon’s mandate that each service member submit to, and take the COVID-19 jab. He knows former team members who retired rather than submit to an experimental “vaccine” that wasn’t really a “vaccine.” They had the advantage of retiring rather than being “fired” for refusing a vaccine. Others weren’t so fortunate.
The healthiest of men and women, the tip of the spear of American power were forced out – in fact “fired” — because they chose to not submit to the COVID “jab.” Some did so on religious grounds, some refused because the jab was, in fact, experimental, and others had already contracted COVID and had natural immunity. No matter – the DoD ordered all service members to submit or be fired. Those who were fired were not eligible for retirement and had collected bonuses. Some of those bonuses are substantial. In the case of “S.O” bonuses, the bonus amount is in five figures.
My colleague Streiff offered some insight when I spoke with him about it:
“If you have an enlistment bonus and don’t complete your contractual term of service, the contract allows the government to claw back the bonus. The same applies for attending a service academy and failing to graduate makes you liable for the cost of your education.
“The other part of the equation is that the bonuses are paid in increments over the length of the contract. If you enlist for 4 years, you get 1/4 on enlistment and the other increments on the anniversary of the contract.”
Yes, service members sign contracts and the bonuses are paid out pursuant to the terms of a contract. If the service member is “fired” because he or she had COVID and recovered but didn’t want the shot, or for other reasons detailed above the DoD has a “right” to clawback bonus monies. Does it make it right? No, not in the least.
Roughly 8,400 service members were terminated because they refused the COVID-19 vaccine. Now the Pentagon is demanding that terminated soldiers pay back their bonus money.
One soldier who was fired called it a final “kick in the face.”
According to Fox News:
[A] soldier had signed a contract with the Army for six years and received a $7,000 bonus. However, because he fell short of the six years, the military notified him that he owed the government a prorated amount of slightly over $4,000. In order to pay it back, he ended up having to “sell” 60 of his unused vacation days to cover the amount owed.
The soldier said of the clawback:
“I’ve deployed multiple times, and I feel like the last thing I had was selling leave days that I earned and was never able to take due to me being deployed or needing that time to prepare for the training cycle. I was about to enter a new world with no income, and that extra bit would have been a nice buffer in my rainy day fund to keep me afloat until I was able to find new employment,”
Is the Pentagon allowed to do this? Of course, it can. Contractually, the DoD can recover the bonus monies. But since the Pentagon is no longer mandating COVID shots, and the Secretary of Defense signed a memorandum that removed letters of reprimand from the service records of members who requested exemptions from the “jab,” the right thing to do would be to drop the clawback.
Although Republican lawmakers have pressured the DoD for “back pay” for fired service members, the Pentagon has said that back pay is “not an issue it is pursuing.”
This seems to be a “FAFO” for fired service members. The Pentagon doesn’t have to pursue clawbacks, but it is. It appears to be a bit of vengeance against the men and women who wanted to serve their country but wouldn’t submit to being guinea pigs.
We can thank General Milley and Secretary Austin for this final act of vengeance.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member