U.S. Senator John Fetterman (D-PA) stood outside his congressional office where a POW-MIA flag and a rainbow flag are on display. He said the two flags represent “two core values of mine.”
Fetterman explained in an edited video: “I am unapologetically pro-military, also very pro for the LGBTQ communities, and I would like to remind everyone there was a time when it was very controversial to desegregate our military.
“And there was a time it was incredibly controversial to have women serve in a combat role and it was also very controversial regarding who one loves.”
[Women were officially allowed to serve in all combat roles in the U.S. military in 2016, when Leon Panetta was Secretary of Defense during the second Obama administration.]
I want @DeptofDefense to be the most lethal force in human history—I will always vote for that.
— U.S. Senator John Fetterman (@SenFettermanPA) February 13, 2025
I will also never vote to degrade anyone.
It’s not woke shit. It’s the inherent dignity of every servicemember regardless of race, gender, who they love or how they identify.
I call… pic.twitter.com/flLilOtLVJ
Note: Fetterman voted against Trump’s Secretary of Defense nomination of Pete Hegseth, who has said that “women shouldn’t be in combat at all,” and last week released a memo that said the U.S. military will no longer allow transgender people to enlist.
Fetterman is now “calling on POTUS to rescind the order” to ban transgender people from the military, and the senator vows, “I will also never vote to degrade anyone.”
[Note: President Biden’s executive order in January 2021 allowed most transgender people to serve in the US military. It reversed a 2017 ban implemented by President Trump.]
Fetterman added: “That’s why I’m encouraging you to honor the inherent dignity of how you identify, and I am going to defend and lean in for the trans community now because right now it might not be popular to do that, that’s exactly the reason why I’m choosing to lean in on right now and stand with this community.
“And I am calling to rescind that kind of executive orders and to allow and honor the inherent dignity of the soldier and regardless of whatever the race is, whatever the gender is, whatever they love or how they identify, and remember that does make for a military that’s fully compatible with being lethal and to win wars.” (Note: Hegseth has vowed to emphasize the military’s “lethality.”
Fetterman’s video is being criticized by Trump supporters including Retired Air Force Lt. Colonel Robert “Buzz” Patterson, who replied to the Senator: “See, that’s the problem. Both can’t be true. They are mutually exclusive.”
Philadelphian Karen Duffy replied to Patterson: “I am confused by this answer…SO if my daughter is a active military combatant fighting with her peers to protect our Country U disagree. I disagree with a fox news host National Guard who has just sold us out to Putin. I would rather see a actual combatant hold this post.”
Note: Hegseth, the former Fox & Friends co-host, served in the U.S. Army National Guard and was deployed to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, Iraq and Afghanistan and earned two Bronze Stars and a combat infantry badge.
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