119-sres408

[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. Res. 408 Introduced in Senate

    (IS) ]

<DOC>

119th CONGRESS
 1st Session
S. RES. 408

Recognizing September 20, 2025, as ``National LGBTQ+ Servicemembers and 
 Veterans Day''.

_______________________________________________________________________

 IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

 September 18 (legislative day, September 16), 2025

Mr. Merkley (for himself, Ms. Baldwin, Mr. Bennet, Mr. Blumenthal, Ms. 
 Duckworth, Mr. Fetterman, Ms. Hirono, Mr. Lujan, Mrs. Murray, Mr. 
 Padilla, Mr. Sanders, Mr. Schatz, Mr. Schiff, Ms. Smith, Ms. Warren, 
 Mr. Whitehouse, Mr. Wyden, Mr. Booker, and Mr. Durbin) submitted the 
following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Veterans' 
 Affairs

_______________________________________________________________________

 RESOLUTION

Recognizing September 20, 2025, as ``National LGBTQ+ Servicemembers and 
 Veterans Day''.

Whereas lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (referred to in this 
 preamble as ``LGBTQ+'') servicemembers and veterans have honorably 
 served in the Armed Forces in every war to which the United States was a 
 party, beginning with the Revolutionary War;
Whereas LGBTQ+ servicemembers and veterans have served in the Armed Forces 
 despite discriminatory policies based on who they love or how they 
 identify;
Whereas, on April 27, 1953, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed Executive 
 Order 10450 (18 Fed. Reg. 2489; relating to security requirements for 
 Government employment), which declared ``sexual perversion'' and 
 ``treatment for serious mental or neurological disorders'' to be 
 security risks and grounds for denying Federal employment;
Whereas Executive Order 10450, eventually repealed by President Barack Obama in 
 2017, contributed to the ``Lavender Scare'' of the 1950s by banning gay 
 and lesbian people from working in the Government, including in the 
 Armed Forces, and was similarly applied to transgender people as early 
 as 1960;
Whereas, beginning in 1963, Army medical standards disqualified people with 
 ``behavioral disorders'', which was defined to include transgender 
 people, from service in the Army;
Whereas, for 30 years, beginning in the mid-1980s, Department of Defense 
 regulations declared transgender people to be both physically and 
 mentally disordered and abnormal and continued to disqualify transgender 
 people from military service;
Whereas, in 1982, the Department of Defense implemented a policy stating that 
 ``homosexuality is incompatible with military service'', and between 
 1980 and 1990, an average of 1,500 military servicemembers were 
 discharged every year on the basis of their sexual orientation;
Whereas, in 1993, as part of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal 
 Year 1994 (Public Law 103-160; 107 Stat. 1547), Congress enacted the 
 ``Don't Ask, Don't Tell'' policy, which declared that the presence of 
 gay, lesbian, and bisexual people in the Armed Forces was an 
 ``unacceptable risk'' to morale, good order, discipline, and unit 
 cohesion, and required the Armed Forces to discharge servicemembers 
 who--

    (1) engaged in, attempted to engage in, or solicited ``homosexual 
acts'';

    (2) stated that they were homosexual or bisexual; or

    (3) married or attempted to marry a same-sex partner;

Whereas the Department of Defense has acknowledged that 13,472 personnel were 
 discharged from the Armed Forces under the ``Don't Ask, Don't Tell'' 
 policy, and an additional 19,365 personnel were discharged between 1980 
 and 1993 under similar policies that targeted servicemembers based on 
 sexual orientation;
Whereas the White House estimates that more than 100,000 servicemembers have 
 been discharged from the Armed Forces for their sexual orientation or 
 gender identity;
Whereas, on September 20, 2011, the ``Don't Ask, Don't Tell'' policy was 
 officially repealed, 60 days after President Barack Obama approved its 
 repeal on July 22, 2011, by signing the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act 
 of 2010 (10 U.S.C. 654 note; Public Law 111-321);
Whereas, on June 30, 2016, the Department of Defense announced an end to the ban 
 on transgender servicemembers across all components of the Department of 
 Defense;
Whereas, on July 26, 2017, President Donald J. Trump announced that transgender 
 people would not be allowed to serve in the military;
Whereas, on January 25, 2021, President Joseph R. Biden signed Executive Order 
 14004 (86 Fed. Reg. 7471; relating to enabling all qualified Americans 
 to serve their country in uniform), which repealed the 2017 ban on 
 transgender military servicemembers;
Whereas the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs have 
 taken steps to address the harms done to LGBTQ+ servicemembers and 
 veterans under these discriminatory policies;
Whereas, in March 2021, the Secretary of Defense announced new policies to undo 
 the President Trump-era rules banning transgender people from serving in 
 the military;
Whereas those policies included a statement that the Defense Health Agency would 
 develop clinical practice guidelines to support the medical treatment of 
 servicemembers with gender dysphoria, a step that has not yet been 
 completed;
Whereas, on June 19, 2021, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs announced that the 
 Department of Veterans Affairs would remove the exclusion of gender-
 affirming surgery from the Veterans Affairs Medical Benefits package, 
 but the Department of Veterans Affairs has yet to fulfill that promise;
Whereas, on September 20, 2021, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs issued the 
 ``Benefits Eligibility for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer 
 (LGBTQ+) Former Service Members (VIEWS 5810856)'' memorandum detailing 
 how certain former servicemembers discharged under the ``Don't Ask, 
 Don't Tell'' policy with ``other than honorable'' discharges could begin 
 to access full veterans benefits;
Whereas, on September 20, 2023, the Deputy Secretary of Defense announced that 
 the Department of Defense would proactively review the military records 
 of certain veterans discharged under the ``Don't Ask, Don't Tell'' 
 policy to identify those who may be eligible for discharge upgrades;
Whereas, on April 25, 2024, the Department of Veterans Affairs posted a final 
 rule eliminating the regulatory bar for ``homosexual acts involving 
 aggravating circumstances or other factors affecting the performance of 
 duty'' as an obstacle to benefits, which could help reduce the disparity 
 that LGBTQ+ veterans face in applying for their benefits;
Whereas, on June 26, 2024, President Joseph R. Biden pardoned veterans who had 
 been convicted in military courts for consensual sodomy between 1951 and 
 2013 under former article 125 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice;
Whereas, on January 27, 2025, President Donald J. Trump signed Executive Order 
 14183 (90 Fed. Reg. 8757; relating to prioritizing military excellence 
 and readiness), which reinstated the ban on transgender servicemembers 
 and directed the Department of Defense to end its usage of pronouns and 
 prevent transgender people from using facilities that align with their 
 gender identity;
Whereas, on February 7, 2025, the Secretary of Defense issued a memorandum 
 halting all gender-affirming medical procedures for servicemembers;
Whereas, on February 26, 2025, the Department of Defense announced that 
 transgender and nonbinary servicemembers are ``no longer eligible for 
 military service'' and ``will be processed for separation from military 
 service'';
Whereas, on March 17, 2025, the Department of Veterans Affairs announced that it 
 will no longer offer gender-affirming hormone therapy to veterans who 
 were not already receiving such care; and
Whereas challenges still exist for LGBTQ+ servicemembers and veterans seeking 
 equitable treatment in service and access to benefits: Now, therefore, 
 be it
 Resolved, That the Senate--

    (1) recognizes September 20, 2025, as ``National LGBTQ+ 
 Servicemembers and Veterans Day'';

    (2) celebrates the contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual, 
 transgender, and queer (referred to in this resolution as 
 ``LGBTQ+'') servicemembers and veterans who have served in the 
 Armed Forces;

    (3) regrets the harm done to LGBTQ+ servicemembers and 
 veterans under the ``Don't Ask, Don't Tell'' policy and earlier 
 policies, bans on transgender servicemembers, and other 
 policies that discriminate based on sexual orientation and 
 gender identity;

    (4) recognizes how ``other than honorable'' and 
 ``dishonorable'' discharges given to LGBTQ+ servicemembers on 
 the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity--
        (A) prematurely terminated the careers of LGBTQ+ 
 servicemembers in the Armed Forces;
        (B) subjected LGBTQ+ servicemembers to the trauma 
 of investigations and criminal charges;
            (C) unfairly denied LGBTQ+ servicemembers the honor 
 associated with military service;
            (D) deprived LGBTQ+ servicemembers of benefits 
 those servicemembers have earned and deserve as 
 veterans; and
        (E) continue to cause LGBTQ+ servicemembers 
 dignitary harm;

    (5) urges the Department of Veterans Affairs and the 
 Department of Defense--
        (A) to implement policy changes that restore 
 justice and right wrongs caused by past and present 
 government-sponsored discrimination; and
        (B) to conduct further outreach to LGBTQ+ service 
 member and veteran communities to ensure that those 
 discharged based on their sexual orientation and gender 
 identity can receive their benefits;

    (6) urges the Department of Veterans Affairs and the 
 Department of Defense to ensure that transgender veterans and 
 servicemembers and their families have access to the full range 
 of health care, including gender-affirming care; and

    (7) urges the Department of Veterans Affairs to remove the 
 exclusion of gender-affirming surgery from the Veterans Affairs 
 Medical Benefits Package.
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