Jackie Speier: “Last Friday, the President signed Executive Order 13669, which amended the Manual for Courts-Martial. This order…”

“Last Friday, the President signed Executive Order 13669, which amended the Manual for Courts-Martial. This order delivers a significant blow to an already broken military justice system that will further revictimize servicemembers brave enough to come forward and report that they have been sexually assaulted. Specifically contained in this executive order is a provision that makes Military Rules of Evidence 412 admissible in article 32 preliminary proceedings. This particular rule of evidence outlines when previous sexual history is admissible in court-martial proceedings and is currently applied to make all sorts of demeaning and irrelevant innuendos about a victim's previous sexual history admissible in courts-martial. Now, mind you, rape shield laws have been passed by virtually every State in the Union, and the question I have is why should servicemembers be considered second-class citizens in this country? Shockingly, this order doubles down on this harmful rule and allows the sexual history to be admissible in preliminary hearings. What is even worse, under the order, the convening authority will be able to read and consider evidence deemed inadmissible by the article 32 hearing. The military has clearly learned nothing from the Wilkerson case in Aviano, Italy.…”