[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 13]
[House]
[Pages 17747-17748]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           STOP MILITARY RAPE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Speier) for 5 minutes.
  Ms. SPEIER. Mr. Speaker, I, too, rise to pay my respect and to honor 
Representative Cleaver.
  I am one of those many Members of the House who each week waits for 
that letter from Congressman Cleaver. In each of these letters, he 
tells a life lesson, typically one to inspire us to be more hopeful, to 
be more willing to look at the issue from someone else's perspective, 
to be more compassionate, to be more loving. So I, too, share in his 
commitment to making this place a more responsive environment for all, 
and I thank Mr. Cleaver for his great leadership as the chair of the 
CBC over the last year.
  Mr. Speaker, I now would like to turn to my prepared remarks for this 
morning. I would like to read you some song lyrics that Air Force 
Technical Sergeant Jennifer Smith found on her government computer at 
Shaw Air Force Base. The lyrics of the song are called the ``The S&M 
Man,'' and they go like this:

       Who can take a machete, whack off all her limbs, Throw her 
     in the ocean, and watch her try to swim?
  The S&M Man.

  Jennifer Smith reported this song and other sexually explicit 
documents to her superiors in the Air Force. ``The S&M Man'' is 
offensive, it's hostile, but to her male colleagues and superiors, the 
song is just tradition, a tradition that is alive and well, celebrated 
in song, patches, coins, offensive pictures, behavior, and the tacit 
approval of commanding officers.
  A military tradition of demeaning women is not only sickening, but 
contrary to the fundamental principles of an institution founded in 
respect and honor and in discipline. It undermines our military's 
readiness and cohesion. Simply put, it gravely damages the military.
  This is the 24th time that I have come to the floor to share the 
story of a servicemember, either man or woman, who has been raped, 
sexually assaulted, or harassed by fellow servicemembers. By the 
Department of Defense's own records and estimates, there are 19,000 
rapes and sexual assaults each year in the military, and the VA reports 
that half a million veterans are affected by military sexual trauma.

                              {time}  1050

  Still, fewer than 14 percent of these victims actually report the 
crimes. And why is that? It is because so few are prosecuted--fewer 
than 9 percent--and a minuscule number end in conviction.
  Air Force Sergeant Jennifer Smith has been subjected to this toxic 
culture for nearly two decades. She finally had enough. She filed a 
lawsuit; and in her lawsuit, she chronicles 17 years of abuse and a 
toxic culture--from 1995 until the present time--a culture that speaks 
of repulsive and destructive behavior by servicemembers and the tacit 
approval of their commanders.
  Jennifer Smith joined the Air Force 17 years ago, when she was just 
18 years of age. Her career has been filled with promotions and with 
medals and commendations by her commanding officers. She is one of the 
soldiers whom we so highly regard in the military. She has a record of 
astonishing accomplishments. In many of the commendations, she has been 
told that she is a ``gifted mentor'' who ``goes above and beyond'' and 
to ``promote her now.'' Her career has also been filled with sexual 
harassment, assaults, and complacency--or worse--from her commanding 
officers.
  During her five deployments in Iraq, Kuwait, Korea, and Germany, 
Sergeant Smith has endured assault by a master sergeant, who pushed her 
into a room, dropped his pants, and tried to force himself on her; 
harassment by a vice commander, who told her to relax and take her top 
off during a meeting; constant exposure to pornographic material and 
sexually explicit flight songs; and an attempted rape she was too 
scared to report.
  Sergeant Smith endured sexual harassment and a hostile work 
environment for 13 years when she decided to speak up. It's time for 
all of us to speak up. It's time for all of us to expect from the 
military what we expect from the private sector--no hostile work 
environment.
  She found pornographic materials in her squadron that included two 
``Doofer'' books and magazines that were in her shared office. She 
reported them, but nothing was done.
  Later that year, approximately two months after Technical Sergeant 
Smith had deployed to Iraq, she was assaulted outside of the gym. A man 
grabbed her from behind and physically dragged her to a dark place 
behind the building.
  The man pushed her up against the wall and groped her. He had his arm 
under her neck, lifting her feet off the ground. He said, ``I could 
kill you right now .  .  . and no one is going to miss you.''
  Technical Sergeant Smith was able to break free, and ran away as fast 
as she could. She went to work the next day and did not say anything 
about it because she feared retaliation and harassment.
  This is happening now--in January 2012, Technical Sergeant Smith was 
back from Iraq at Shaw Air Base to manage pilot training. Whenever she 
checked her computer, she was bombarded with sexually hostile documents 
and videos. She reported the offensive material. Nothing was done.
  In response to news coverage Sergeant Smith's formal complaint, Air 
Force Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Welsh ordered a service-wide sweep of 
workspaces and public areas for images, calendars and other materials 
that objectify women.
  This sweep is inadequate, or worse. It appears to be a response to 
bad press rather than an aggressive tool to root out and expose this 
toxic culture.
  The sweep which began on Wednesday, December 5th, provides a twelve-
day window

[[Page 17748]]

 for it to be completed after a very public notification.
  This window and public notification intentionally or unintentionally 
provides service members the time to hide the content, and the 
opportunity for commanding officers to not find anything. Why did the 
Air Force tip off service members that the sweep was taking place? 
Commanding officers who performed the sweep also had an incentive not 
to find anything because it would reflect poorly on the command climate 
they are charged with maintaining.
  This sweep also did not include individual desks, cabinet drawers, 
lockers, or military issued computer hard drives, where much of the 
content in the Smith complaint was stored.
  Describing the need for a sweep, General Welsh explained, ``In my 
view, all this stuff is connected.
  If we're going to get serious about things like sexual assault, we 
have to get serious about an environment that could lead to sexual 
harassment. In some ways, this stuff can all be linked.''
  I agree with General Welsh. It's time to get serious about sexual 
assault in the military, but this must include credible and effective 
oversight actions to counter the culture that permits and fosters 
systemic harassment, assault, and rape.
  And even with effective sweeps, it won't be as easy as taking down a 
calendar or deleting a computer file. Ending the epidemic of rape and 
sexual assault in the military will require a reboot of the military 
justice system, and addressing commander influence in these all too 
common cases. We owe Jennifer Smith and her many colleagues subjected 
to this gross harassment better. We don't tolerate it in the private 
sector.

                          ____________________