The Pentagon’s acting inspector general warned woke Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin of “potential noncompliance” when denying the religious exemption requests from service members who did not want to take the coronavirus vaccine, according to a memo obtained by Breitbart News.
The June 2, 2022, memo from Acting Inspector General Sean W. O’Donnell to Austin said the potential noncompliance by the Department of Defense was identified through complaints submitted to the DOD IG’s office.
“The Department of Defense (DOD) Hotline received dozens of complaints regarding denied religious accommodation requests from Service members. We found a trend of generalized assessments rather than the individualized assessment that is required by Federal law and DoD and Military Service policies,” O’Donnell wrote.
He added:
The denial memorandums we reviewed generally did not reflect an individualized analysis, demonstrating that the Senior Military Official considered the full range of facts and circumstances relevant to the particular religious accommodation request.
He said the volume and rate at which decisions were made to deny requests is “concerning,” finding an average of 50 denials a day processed over a 90-day period.
“Assuming a 10-hour work day with no breaks or attention to other matters, the average review period was about 12 minutes for each package. Such a review period seems insufficient to process each request in an individualized manner and still perform the duties required of their position,” O’Donnell said.
The memo, which was first reported by a military whistleblower who goes by the name “Terminal CWO” and obtained by Breitbart News, is accompanied by another memo showing that it was not until three months later, on September 2, 2022, that Austin forwarded the DOD IG memo to the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness for “appropriate action.”
Although Austin did not say whether he was aware of the DOD IG’s stated concerns, the occurrence of blanket denials of service members’ religious accommodation requests was no secret.