When you do leave the military, you’re potentially leaving with this degree from a university like Harvard or MIT or Georgetown. If you’re taking that away as options that’s going to hurt for retention of officers and recruiting of new officers,” said Peoples, a former Army captain who became an officer through the ROTC program at the University of California, Los Angeles.
He also called curtailing options for higher education “a slap in the face to some of these officers” to insinuate they could become brainwashed simply by being exposed to left-leaning ideology.
“I think it undermines the quality of officers that we have in the military, to think that going to one of these universities is a, I don’t know, a danger to the military,” he said.
Lawmakers also have expressed concerns over Hegseth’s recent actions, with the House Armed Services Committee minority staff submitting a request for information on this issue to the Defense Department last week. They have yet to receive a response, a committee minority staffer told The Hill.
Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), the panel’s ranking member, said in a statement to The Hill that he was “deeply troubled” by reports that the Pentagon is considering severing academic partnerships with other colleges and universities in addition to Harvard.
“If these reports are true, this stands as another glaring example of Secretary Hegseth’s attempts to erode apolitical norms as part of his ongoing rightwing culture war,” Smith said. “That is why we have asked the Department to provide a full accounting of the nature of any ongoing assessment of colleges and universities for receipt of Departmental funding, including for consideration of denial of tuition assistance.”
He urged his colleagues in the majority “to join us in ensuring the Department does not waste further time and resources on what appears to be a blatant political ploy that undermines our ability to build and retain the best military in the world and threatens serious national security risks-The Hill
Translate This Article
