House Members Question Military Enlistment Bans For Applicants With Undocumented Dependents
PHOENIX – Members of Congress are seeking answers from military leaders following reports of enlistment policies that ban United States citizens and other eligible applicants if they have spouses or children who are in the country illegally.
Fronteras Desk reported earlier this week that the Armed Services have policies in place to deny applicants who have immigrant dependents without papers.
That revelation prompted more than 30 House representatives from both sides of the aisle to write to the heads of the Navy, Army and Air Force asking for clarification about their enlistment policies.
Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) and Rep. Mike Coffman (R-Colo.) co-authored the letter, which was dated Nov. 21.
"There is no reason that we could think of why any branch of the military would want to restrict that military service of U.S. citizens based on the immigration status of someone in the family," said Douglas Rivlin, the communications director for Gutierrez.
"They want to know why this is being done and whether there is a plan to redress this, [it] seems to be a mistake."
In a statement, Coffman said, "Service in the U.S. military is the highest duty one can perform for the country, so I am very concerned about the possible exclusionary enlistment policies currently being implemented by our armed service branches."
Department of Defense spokesman Nate Christensen told Fronteras Desk earlier this week that the agency does not have a policy on this issue, but the individual services have instituted policies because of "administrative and security concerns."
Christensen said military spouses in the country illegally would be ineligible for military ID cards.
Fronteras Desk received independent confirmation from both the Navy and the Army that their enlistment policies ban applicants who have dependents without legal status.
Kathleen Welker, a spokeswoman for the Army Recuriting Command, told Fronteras Desk that an Army legal analysis from 2010 concluded these applicants could be in violation of a federal statute that makes it a crime to harbor or conceal an immigrant in the country illegally.
The members of Congress who signed on to the letter include representatives from Arizona, California, Nevada and Texas, among others.
