By J.M. Phelps | American Family News
Looking back on a 20-year career in the U.S. Coast Guard, a retired IT chief says an armed forces that demands baseline standards to serve in uniform is still recovering from lowering those standards while demanding everyone roll up a sleeve for the experimental COVID-19 shot.
Rocky Rogers, 42, who retired in August 2022, says he hit retirement during what he calls the tyrannical-like vaccine mandate.
While the pending retirement helped shield him from that controversy, many fellow “Coasties” did not have such an opportunity. So he watched them endure forced separation after their requests for a religious accommodation were denied by the Department of Homeland Security.
The same year Rogers retired, in a letter to the Coast Guard commandant, Republican lawmakers demanded to know why more than 1,300 Coast Guard members were denied a religious accommodation from the COVID-19 shot.
Not only were the accommodation requests denied, the GOP lawmakers said, they were denied en masse without a case-by-case determination.
To be accepted into U.S. armed forces, Rogers says, there are certain standards that must be met. For example, these may include citizenship status, education level, medical or physical requirements, and up-to date-vaccinations.
According to Rogers, there are two very important terms that are not interchangeable which are “standards and exemptions” for a person wearing a military uniform.
“Military standards are the baseline, bottom of the barrel,” he tells AFN, “for what is required within the personnel applying and serving in our military.”
For those who do not or cannot meet this baseline, he or she must submit a waiver to obtain an exemption. That exemption states the service member’s inability to meet a standard and therefore makes he or she unfit for duty and non-deployable.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, accommodations and exemptions became intertwined in the Cost Guard. Even though the issue of religious accommodations was addressed with an official Commandant Instruction, known as 1000.15, Rogers watched his own accommodation requests get denied despite raising the issue of human cells being used for the vaccine.
With each denial that Rogers received, the requirement remained the same. The only authorized injections were one of three EUA vaccines: Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, which was unlawful. Religious accommodations were blanketly denied.
Looking ahead with President Trump
With respect to standards, Rogers says he is appalled by the obesity problem plaguing the military but grateful the Trump administration is tackling the issue.
“The word ‘standard’ means these are the minimal requirements to be met,” Rogers points out. “If a military branch or any organization, has high standards, the qualifying criteria are still the minimum requirements for that group.”
On occasion, however, a service member may fraudulently seek an exemption from physical training that is unrelated to an actual, legitimate injury.
In a related AFN article, a May 1 story pointed out the number of overweight and obese U.S. service members jumped dramatically in recent years. Leading up the pandemic, the cases averaged 13,863 per year. Over the next four years, from 2020 to 2023, the average jumped to 21,969 per year. That data reflected a staggering 190% jump in cases.
And at a time when almost 68% of the country’s Reserve forces are overweight, Rogers says exemptions for some of these service members can come in the form of “weight waivers.”
This makes him question why a standard exists at all for physical training and weight.
“If a person is exempt from meeting the minimum requirement, then you’re allowing that person to weaken your organization,” he argues.
That doesn’t mean the Pentagon is ignoring the problem, and Rogers praises Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for demanding fitness standards to create a tougher, more ruthless military.
In an X post, Hegseth called the statistic on the Reserves “completely unacceptable” moving forward.
“This is what happens when standards are IGNORED — and this is what we are changing. REAL fitness & weight standards are here. We will be FIT, not FAT,” Hegseth wrote.
Now, with Donald Trump as commander in chief, Rogers says he is hopeful the new administration will take a closer look at religious accommodations and the religious beliefs of those in uniform.
In the Coast Guard, that would fall to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.
Rogers and many others have not forgotten how requests for religious accommodation were denied while some obese service members were given exemptions.
“Signing up to serve the country requires a contract, and these standards are part of that contract,” Rogers shares. “If a person can’t maintain the minimal requirements of a standard to serve, this is a breach of contract.”
First published on American Family News
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