Progress!

Impressive for an pro-NRA upstate New Yorker

Senate To Hold DADT Hearings

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York announced Monday that the Senate ARmed Services Committee has agreed to hold hearings on "don't ask, don't tell." The hearings will be the first ever held in the Senate on the military's gay ban since it was instituted in 1993. The House held hearings in the summer of 2008.

“This policy is wrong for our national security and wrong for the moral foundation upon which our country was founded,’” Senator Gillibrand said in statement. “I thank Chairman Levin for agreeing to hold this important hearing. Numerous military leaders are telling us that the times have changed. ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ is an unfair, outdated measure that violates the civil rights of some of our bravest, most heroic men and women. By repealing this policy, we will increase America’s strength – both militarily and morally.”

Gillibrand had been considering offering an amendment to the Department of Defense authorization bill that would have suspended discharges for the entirety of the 111th Congress, but she determined that she did not have the 60 votes necessary to successfully attach the measure.