The Department of Defense (DOD) announced that it has begun the process of reinstating service members who were removed after refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccine.
“I’m excited to give you this update about the department’s efforts to welcome back former service members who left service due to the department’s past wrongful COVID-19 vaccine mandate,” said Tim Dill, performing the duties of Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness.
“Former service members who were involuntarily separated solely due to their COVID-19 vaccine status are now receiving letters of apology from the department in the mail, along with instructions on how they can pursue returning to service,” he explained.
Discussing the opportunity for service members to return to the military, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, “If you are a person of conscience, a person of faith who believe that you shouldn’t have to take an experimental vaccine in order to serve in our military, we will apologize to you, we will recognize the wrong that’s been done, we will welcome you back with rank and back pay, and we want your service.”
“We started it as quickly as possible. As you can imagine, sometimes these things take a little bit of time to work out. All the letters are out to the folks who were pushed out, and we welcome them back as quickly and robustly as possible,” Hegseth said during an interview with Fox News. “These are some of our best and brightest. We were kicking out folks with 17 years in, 18 years in, 19 years in, saying, ‘Sorry, you won’t take the jab. You can’t serve.’ That was an outrage.”
An estimated 8,700 service members were removed from the military for refusing the vaccine.
The opportunity for reinstatement follows President Donald Trump’s executive order directing officials to “make reinstatement available to all members of the military (active and reserve) who were discharged solely for refusal to receive the COVID-19 vaccine and who request to be reinstated.” The order also allows those reinstated to “revert to their former rank and receive full back pay, benefits, bonus payments, or compensation.”
