releases: https://www.mccaskill.senate.gov/media-center/latest-headlines/pentagon-report-on-mccaskill-sexual-assault-revisions-due-this-week
Data license: MIT · Data source: dwillis/congress-press
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| https://www.mccaskill.senate.gov/media-center/latest-headlines/pentagon-report-on-mccaskill-sexual-assault-revisions-due-this-week | Pentagon report on McCaskill sexual assault revisions due this week | 2014-12-02 | 2014 | 2014-12 | Democrat | House | MO | Claire McCaskill | M001170 | www.mccaskill.senate.gov | legacy | Pentagon report on McCaskill sexual assault revisions due this week Tuesday, December 2, 2014 By: Chuck Raasch WASHINGTON • A Pentagon report on military sexual-assault reform that is due any day could tell much about future battles over the issue involving Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. The report is expected to tell how the military has implemented reforms in a McCaskill-sponsored bill, passed last year, aimed at strengthening alleged victim rights and toughening offenders' sentences. But a bipartisan group of senators on Tuesday, arguing that change has not come fast enough in the military, decided to try one last time in this Congress for further reforms. Those senators, led by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, want to attach their proposed changes to the Defense Authorization bill that is working its way through Congress. But the possibility of amendment is remote with Congress winding down its business. Gillibrand's proposal would remove commanders from having a say in deciding whether to prosecute members of the military for sexual assault, leaving that decision to military prosecutors. At a press conference, the senators brought as their ally they former chief prosecutor for the U.S. Air Force. Retired Col. Don Christensen, who just recently became president of a sexual-assault survivors group called Protect Our Defenders, said that commanders are sometimes "enablers." and should be left out of prosecutions. Defenders say commanders should be involved as part of the military's chain of command. McCaskill did not respond to this new push by Gillibrand. The two senators have clashed over the best way to tackle military sexual assault reform during the current Congress, but they also have partnered on a separate push to strengthen reporting, training and prosecution guidelines for sexual assaults on college campuses. Therefore, McCaskill has a lot at stake in the upcoming Pentagon report. Writing in the Huffington Post, McCaskill said her legislation that passed a year ago this week ushered in "historic reforms," and pointed out that it has backstops and checks on commanders, including "civilian review if a commander decides against a prosecution when a prosecutor wants to go to trial." She also said that her legislation now guarantees that alleged victims get independent lawyers and that minimum sentencing of dishonorable discharge is applied to any military member found guilty of sexual assault. McCaskill said she will be primarily looking for three things in the Pentagon report: • Whether sexual assault reporting is up in the military • Whether actual incidents are going down; •What troops have to say about the changes. "When President Obama signed our reforms into law one year ago, a healthy policy debate was still ongoing in the Senate over whether some additional reforms--or even an alternate system entirely--were needed," McCaskill wrote in Huffington Post. "While that debate played out, the President gave military leaders one year to implement the defense bill and show significant progress. And so this week, those military leaders will give their report to the President." Print Email Tweet | 1 | 2026-03-30T12:14:52Z | 2026-03-30T12:14:52Z |