Women in Uniform

Women in Uniform

There are those in the Congress that want to restrict the Consitutional rights of women who wear the uniform, just because they are stationed overseas. I could not disagree more.

I support a woman's right to choose. In 2000, I was stationed at Incirlik airbase in Turkey as part of an aircrew flying against the Iraqi military. The U.S. base hospital was clean and manned by American doctors. The nearby Turkish hospital in Adana was dirty and manned by doctors who could not speak English. I would never force an American who wears this nation's uniform to get medical care from a foreign clinic.

Women who wear America's uniform are entitled to all the rights and protections of our Constitution. They defend it with their lives. They should never be treated as second-class citizens. In my book, anyone who wears the uniform is a first-class citizen. Citizen-soldiers must have all of the American rights they put their lives on the line to defend. Women in uniform should not lose a single right or privilege just because they are stationed overseas on the front line of freedom.

On May 10, 2006, Representative Robert Andrews (D-NJ) offered an amendment to the Fiscal Year (FY) 2007 Defense Authorization bill, H.R. 5122, which would repeal the current ban on soldiers or sailors paying for their own abortions in military hospitals overseas. I voted for the Andrews amendment because the rights each of us have in this country are defended by Americans we send abroad. The men and women of our armed forces deserve every protection of the Constitution they pledged their lives to defend.

http://www.house.gov/list/speech/il10_kirk/abortion1.html