{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.donnelly.senate.gov/newsroom/article/donnelly-seeks-to-end-the-tragedy", "Donnelly Seeks to 'End the Tragedy'", "2014-12-11", "2014", "2014-12", "Democrat", "House", "IN", "Joe Donnelly", "D000607", "www.donnelly.senate.gov", null, null, "legacy", "Donnelly Seeks to 'End the Tragedy'\t\r\n\t\t\t\t\r\n                \r\n                His legislation aimed at military suicides set for Senate vote\r\n                \r\n            \r\n            \r\n            \r\n                \r\n                    By:\u00a0\r\n                    Brian Francisco\r\n                \r\n            \r\n            \r\n                \r\n                \r\n                \r\n            Thursday, December 11, 2014\r\n            \n\t\n\r\n            \r\n            WASHINGTON \u2013 More U.S. soldiers, sailors and airmen are being lost to suicide than to combat, U.S. Sen. Joe Donnelly said Wednesday.\r\nDuring 2013, he said, 475 members of the military took their lives, compared with 132 killed in battle.\r\n\u201cThat\u2019s happened two years straight now,\u201d Donnelly, D-Ind., said at a Capitol Hill news conference, adding that 2014 has followed a similar pace.\r\n\u201cWe have to break the chain. We have to end the tragedy,\u201d he said.\r\nDonnelly, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has sponsored legislation requiring yearly mental health assessments for all active, National Guard and Reserve members of the military.\r\nHis proposal is incorporated into the defense bill that comes before the Senate for a vote today or Friday. The House approved the bill last week.\r\nDonnelly\u2019s measure, called the Jacob Sexton Military Suicide Prevention Act, is named for an east-central Indiana soldier who, at age 21, fatally shot himself in 2009 in a Muncie movie theater while on leave from his deployment to Afghanistan.\r\nMilitary suicides \u201calso happen to young men and women who have never been overseas, who have never been deployed,\u201d Donnelly said. \u201cAnd so this is a servicewide problem.\u201d\r\nCurrently, he said, mental health screenings are required only for troops on a deployment cycle. His legislation includes provisions to safeguard the privacy of personnel who seek and receive mental health treatment, and it calls for the Pentagon to evaluate and report on its mental health practices.\r\nPete Duffy, legislative director of the National Guard Association of the United States, said the Guard had the highest suicide rate among military branches in 2013 \u2013 33.4 suicides for every 100,000 troops. Sexton was a Guard member from Farmland in Randolph County.\r\nBy comparison, the national suicide rate in 2012 was roughly 13 deaths for every 100,000 people, according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, which has endorsed Donnelly\u2019s legislation.\r\n\u201cWe\u2019re going to have the assessments. Now we need to have funded programs to address mental health concerns when they are discovered in the assessments,\u201d said Duffy, a retired Army colonel.\r\n\u201cThe tragedy to Jacob, Jacob\u2019s family, the losing (military) unit, the loss of readiness cannot continue.\u201d\r\nMembers of advocacy groups for suicide prevention, mental health, military families and family therapy also spoke in favor of Donnelly\u2019s bill, co-sponsored by Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss.\r\nDonnelly said he can\u2019t tell how his legislation, if signed into law, might affect recruitment and re-enlistment.\r\n\u201cBut I will tell you that if I were in the service at this time and knew that I had the option to have somebody to talk to and it wouldn\u2019t be stigmatized, that seeking help would actually be considered a strength, I would think that would be a plus for continuing (military) service,\u201d he said.\r\nEarlier, Donnelly said the assessments also might uncover mental health problems that can lead military personnel to cause harm to others.\r\n\u201cThis can help in case after case after case, not only suicide but also for those who are facing challenges \u2013 that they have somebody to talk to and maybe prevent them from taking it out on somebody else,\u201d he said.", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.donnelly.senate.gov/newsroom/article/donnelly-seeks-to-end-the-tragedy"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.8590670768171549, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}