Assembly Joins Senate in Call to End "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Policy

323 language specialists among the 11,000 discharged to date

SACRAMENTO —The California Assembly has approved on a 43-29 vote a resolution calling on President Bush and Congress to support the Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2007 (H.R. 1246), which ends the federal government’s discriminatory policy known as “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

Previously approved by the Senate, the resolution (SJR 6) was authored by Senator Christine Kehoe (D-San Diego) and co-authored by Assemblymember John Laird (D-Santa Cruz), who presented the bill on the Assembly floor and said:

“In San Francisco (at the Pride Celebration) a sergeant (Eric Alva) appeared who was the first casualty in the invasion of Iraq, who lost his leg and now has a prosthesis.  He said he was more worried about being found out as gay then he was about his personal safety, which he risked for this country in that action in Iraq.”

Video link for Laird opening and closing comments from the Assembly floor:

http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a27/video/SJR6entire.WMV

Key statistics included in SJR 6:

• “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was first introduced in 1993 by President Clinton and was crafted by then-Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Colin Powell.
• More than 11,000 service members have been discharged under “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” including nearly 800 in critical occupations (such as counterintelligence experts and medical specialists) and 323 language specialists (including 55 Arabic and 9 Farsi translators).
• At least 65,000 gay and lesbian service members are on active duty today.
• There are approximately 1 million gay and lesbian veterans in the U.S. (including 137,000 in CA).
• Twenty-four nations allow open service by gays and lesbians, with service members from 12 of those nations having served alongside American troops in Operation Enduring Freedom.
• American taxpayers have paid between $250 million and $1.2 billion to investigate, eliminate and replace qualified service members.
• California is home to 26 military bases.

Complete text of SJR 6:
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/07-08/bill/sen/sb_0001-0050/sjr_6_bill_20070320_introduced.html

Analysis of SJR 6:   
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/07-08/bill/sen/sb_0001-0050/sjr_6_cfa_20070620_164058_asm_floor.html

SJR 6 does not require the approval of the governor.  Copies of the resolution will now be sent to President Bush, each Senator and Representative in Congress, and to the presiding officer in each house of each state legislature.