Community | January 25, 2010 | 3 comments

White House Asks Senate to Wait on Don’t Ask Don’t Tell

source: http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/25/pentagon-asks-senate-panel-to-wait-on-dont-ask...

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The Obama administration has asked the Senate Armed Services Committee to delay hearings on the fate of the military’s controversial “con’t ask, don’t tell” policy, because the president expects to discuss it in Wednesday’s address to Congress, the committee chairman said today.

Senator Carl Levin, the Michigan Democrat and chairman of the committee, told reporters that senior Pentagon officials asked him to postpone the hearings, because they do not want to be put in the position of discussing or defending a policy that the White House might abandon.

President Obama campaigned on a promise to press Congress to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell,’’ the Clinton-era law that bars gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military. But the plan met with resistance inside the Pentagon, where senior military leaders have been engaged in discussions about whether and how to roll it back.

Gay rights advocates have been prodding Mr. Obama to live up to his pledge, and have been eagerly awaiting the Armed Services hearings.

“Somebody representing the Pentagon said that the White House, that the president was expected, they thought, to state that policy at the State of the Union; and they thought it made more sense for him to state the policy than for us to have a hearing right before,’’ Mr. Levin said, according to a transcript of the conversation provided by his office.

Mr. Levin, who said he did not favor the policy even when it was enacted, said he intends to hold hearings next month. He said he does not know what Mr. Obama might say in Wednesday’s address.

The White House declined comment.

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/25/pentagon-asks-senate-panel-to-wait...

Photo Note: Photo of Carl Levin, in charge of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
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    Community,   US Politics,   LGBT,   Obama: The First Term
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3 comments // White House Asks Senate to Wait on Don’t Ask Don’t Tell

  • jubal
    • 0
      jubal  

    • Yup, good for Obama. I am glad he is going to keep this promise.

      Now if we can repeal DOMA before the Supreme Court has to hear the Prop 8 case.

    • 2 years ago
  • ryan8566
    • +1
      ryan8566  

    • can any one please explain why this is another 'campaign promise' that obama is willing to break? he could sign this quicker than the many autographs he gives, bolster the # in the military, etc. i will not make the 'ad infinitum, ad nauseum' aree with...but why the delay, esp. when he is losing a great part of the constituency that elected him based on his word?

    • 2 years ago
  • current89
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