From Mike Rose, STARRS Executive Vice President and General Counsel, who has been providing legal assistance to servicemembers negatively affected by the C19 vax mandate and the DEI agenda in the military. This includes the case of Air Force Brig. General Melissa Cunningham, USAFA ’96, which was a simple, clear-cut case but the Air Force was delaying for nearly a year (which we’ve heard was happening for a lot of other people too). Finally, after a STARRS delegation had a meeting with Pentagon officials and sending a letter to Air Force Secretary Troy Meink, the case was resolved.
VICTORY FOR AIR FORCE BRIGADIER GENERAL MELISSA CUNNINGHAM
All, recommend you read the three attachments and the email below. You will see from those documents:
• AF BGen Melissa Cunningham, an Air Force Academy graduate, was the highest ranking officer forced to resign from the Air Force, after being threatened with a court-martialed for refusing to taking the COVID vaccine due to her religious and medical objections;
• The Air Force is providing her complete, although belated, remedies including reinstatement into the Air Force with the rank of B/General, full back pay, credit for service missed, correction of records, extension of date of mandatory retirement, and the opportunity to be considered for promotion to Major General; and
• The detailed complexity of the factors the Air Force Board for Correction of Military Records cited and considered when making these decisions about BGen Cunningham.
STARRS should be proud of this as it was instrumental in guiding her and prompting action by decision makers to achieve these results.
From Brig. General Cunningham:
“I am so grateful to Mike and the STARRS team. I appreciated the opportunity to address the AOG board last fall and hoped my story would put a face to the COVID injustices grads were facing. I’m grateful for Mike’s tenacity and drive to continue to highlight the issue not only for me, but for so many. The tide has turned and momentum is building. One of the things I learned at Charis Bible College last year was to ignore hecklers in the stands and keep running my race. I know the cause is righteous and just. Let’s pick up the pace and lengthen our stride.”
From the USAF BMCR:
From: SAF/MRBC Covid <SAF.MRBC.Covid@us.af.mil>
Sent: Monday, July 13, 2026 10:36 AM
To: ———; mike@mikeroselawfirm.com
Cc: SAF/MRBC Covid <SAF.MRBC.Covid@us.af.mil>
Subject: BC-2025-03132 (Case Signed sent to DFAS)
Ms. Cunningham and Counsel,
Congratulations, your case has been signed! You should receive an encrypted e-mail through our Case Management System with the Record of Proceedings, Directive, and notification of the Board’s results. The message will come from sender: “BCMR Customer Service no-reply-afrba@us.af.mil.
For your convenience, and in case you experience difficulty accessing the encrypted email, we have attached a redacted version of the documents to this message. Your case is now being routed to DFAS, who will prepare the compensation estimate. DFAS should contact you in the near future if additional information is required to process the estimate. Please note that this portion of the process is outside of the AFBCMR, so we cannot provide a timeline.
Once DFAS has completed the compensation estimate, they will send it to you for review. At that point you will have 60 days to accept or decline reinstatement. If you choose to accept reinstatement, corrections to your official records will begin. You will then coordinate with your recruiter, AFPC, and other appropriate offices to receive your orders and assignment.
Thank you for your patience throughout this process, and congratulations again on reaching this milestone.
Have a great day!
v/r
AFBCMR COVID Reinstatement Team
US Air Force Board for Correction of Military Records – Record of Proceedings (8 pages, pdf)
STARRS Letter:
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