Gates asks gay troops to fill out surveys
Published: July 9, 2010
Defense Secretary Robert Gates had a direct message for closeted gay troops at his Pentagon press conference Thursday: Please, please participate in our survey.
“I strongly encourage gays and lesbians who are in the military to fill out these forms,” Gates said after a reporter asked about the effort to poll more than 400,000 troops about how a “don’t ask, don’t tell” repeal might affect them. “We've organized this in a way to protect their privacy and the confidentiality of their responses through a third party, and it's important that we hear from them as well as everybody else.”
Earlier on Thursday the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network issued a statement saying they could not recommend that any homosexual or bisexual troops participate “in any survey being administered by the Department of Defense” because military officials have not offered explicit guarantees that troops who accidentally out themselves in the polls will be allowed to keep their job.
Gates dismissed those concerns, but following his remarks SLDN still discouraged troops from participating in the survey, noting that their legal experts are still discussing the situation with defense officials.
Other gay rights groups have encouraged gay troops to participate in the effort. In a statement, officials with Servicemembers United said they were "satisfied that sufficient measures are in place to protect the confidentiality of any gay and lesbian servicemember who would like to fully and honestly participate in this survey.”
Pentagon officials have refused to release details of the survey questions, but a copy obtained by CNN showed questions such as “would a repeal of prompt you to reconsider serving in the military?” and “would serving under an openly gay commander adversely affect morale?”
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