Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville misses few chances to tout both his career as a college football coach and his love for the military. It\u2019s all the more reprehensible, then, that Tuberville is single-handedly blocking the Pentagon from putting its best team on the field \u2014 and harming the country\u2019s security in the process. <\/p>\n
Since February, Tuberville has placed a blanket hold on the promotion or reassignment of more than 250 US generals and flag officers. He objects to a Pentagon policy, announced after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, that covers the travel costs of service members who cross state lines for abortions. Tuberville insists that because Congress hasn\u2019t enshrined the travel policy into law, the Pentagon needs to scrap it. He\u2019s vowed to block all top military promotions until that happens. <\/p>\n
Due to Tuberville\u2019s intransigence, the Marine Corps lacks a Senate-confirmed commandant for the first time in 164 years. Two more service chiefs are due to retire next month; Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley, the top military adviser to President Joe Biden, will step down on Oct. 1. As seven former defense secretaries noted in a May letter, the commanders of the Navy\u2019s Fifth and Seventh Fleets \u2014 covering the Middle East and Indo-Pacific \u2014 as well as the next US military representative to NATO and US Cyber Command\u2019s director of intelligence are also in limbo. More than 600 senior officers may be affected by the end of the year.<\/p>\n
This leadership void is already damaging military readiness. Officers serving in an acting capacity don\u2019t have the same authority they would if Senate-confirmed: Incoming Marine commandant General Eric Smith, for instance, can\u2019t issue crucial planning guidance for the service. Uncertainty takes a toll on military families, who can\u2019t relocate or receive new salaries until appointments are official.<\/p>\n
Air Force General C.Q. Brown, Biden\u2019s nominee to replace Milley, told lawmakers this week that the promotion backlog will make it harder to persuade junior officers to remain in uniform \u2014 something the US can ill afford amid recruiting shortfalls. It could also slow efforts to retool the military to deter China and roll back Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n
Perhaps most unforgivably, by targeting uniformed officers rather than political appointees, Tuberville risks dragging the US military into the country\u2019s partisan muck. Tuberville maintains that the Senate can break the logjam by holding votes on each promotion, rather than accepting them by unanimous consent, as has traditionally been done. That would make a bad situation worse: It would occupy most of the legislative calendar, needlessly politicize the military-promotion process and only encourage more partisan gamesmanship, as has happened with judges and ambassadors, among other positions.<\/p>\n
If Tuberville thinks that the Pentagon\u2019s abortion policies are better determined by Congress, he should be focused on the hard work of legislating, not obstructing. A vote on the House version of the annual defense spending bill, which now includes an amendment rescinding the policy, will test how much support there is for his position.<\/p>\n
This is a problem for Republicans, not the Pentagon, to solve. Thus far, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has only chided Tuberville obliquely. He needs to go further. He should insist, in private and public if necessary, that the Alabama senator back down and lift his holds without delay. Tuberville may know football, but he has no right to play with the nation\u2019s security.<\/p>\n
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The Editors are members of the Bloomberg Opinion editorial board.<\/p>\n
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