President Joe Biden’s nominee to lead the United States armed services co-authored an August 2022 memo that stipulated preferred racial quotas for Air Force recruiting efforts—spurring criticism from several Republican senators during a July 11 confirmation hearing.
Also touched on at the meeting were military challenges posed by China and Russia—among others—but festered on conservative criticism of Pentagon “woke” diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies.
Air Force commanding officer Gen. Charles “C.Q.” Brown was nominated in May by Mr. Biden to assume the chairmanship of the Department of Defense’s (DOD) Joint Chiefs of Staff to succeed Army Gen. Mark Milley, who is retiring in September.
Gen. Brown—commissioned an Air Force officer 40 years ago—has accrued 3,000 hours flying F-16s over his career, including 130 hours in combat missions.
He has been the Air Force’s highest-ranking officer with a seat at the Joint Chiefs of Staff since 2020.
His July 11 appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee was his first confirmation hearing. There was no vote on his nomination.
The Show-Stopper
But it was Sen. Eric Schmitt’s (R-Mo.) query about 80 minutes into the hearing that underscored GOP ire at the DOD’s implementation of DEI policies that they believe is contributing to the worst recruiting shortfalls in the 50-year history of the nation’s volunteer military.“General,” the former Missouri attorney general asked, “do we have too many white officers in the Air Force?”
“Senator,” Gen. Brown replied, “what I really look at is the quality of all the options that we have. And we look at that aspect—everyone who’s qualified, who meets the qualifications, is promoted.”
“Well, I would agree with you, but that is not the answer, not consistent with your Aug. 29 [2022] memo,” Sen. Schmitt said.
According to that memo, he said, 67.5 percent of the Air Force’s officers should be white, 15 percent Hispanic/Latino, 13 percent African-American, 10 percent Asian American, 1.5 percent American Indian/Native Alaskan, and 1 percent Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander.
“How did you come up with 13 percent should be black? And how did you come up with 10 percent should be Asian?” Sen. Schmitt asked, noting under the memo’s desired racial quotas, the Air Force would need to replace with minorities up to 9 percent of its officer corps—about 5,400 officers—because they are white.
“I’m saddened to see this in this memo,” he added. “There’s this obsession with this sort of race-based politics being interjected into our military.”
Gen. Brown objected to those calculations, noting the memo’s racial quotas were not about force structure, but about recruiting and service academy applications.
“And those numbers are based on the demographics in the nation,” he said.
Regardless, Sen. Schmitt said, “This is a ridiculous conversation, to be perfectly honest,” even if related to recruiting. “Did you contemplate how many black Americans should be in the Air Force? Or how many Asian Americans should be in the Air Force?
“What we looked at was the aspect of providing opportunities for anybody who wants to serve,” Gen. Brown said.
Sen. Schmitt was not dissuaded. “If that were the case, I wouldn’t be asking you these questions,” he said.
“But we have a memo signed by you that you think, right now, there are too many white officers [in the Air Force] in this is a blanket statement.
Racial Quotas Banned
Sen. Schmitt’s questions drew sharp rebukes from Senate Armed Services Committee chair Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) and Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.).“My understanding is that you want to broaden the recruiting and allow anybody who wants to serve or qualifies to serve, and make sure that people have access to service,” Sen. Duckworth said, before asking, “Or are you actually implementing racial quotas and saying only certain number of Asian, certain number of black, certain number of whites can get recruited?”
“We do not have quotas,” Gen. Brown said. “That’s against policy.”
Sen. Reed said the memo, which was also crafted and signed by the Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall III and Undersecretary of the Air Force Gina Ortiz Jones, “base operations chiefs,” and many others in the chain of command, “was designed to increase the pool of applicants, essentially to search for more talent. It was not designed to set the composition” of the force.
“It was only application goals. It was not designed to eliminate the opportunities for anyone,” he said, quoting directly from the memo, which states “‘these goals are aspirational in aligning resources to invest in our long-term objectives … and will not be used in any manner that undermines our merit-based processes.’
“So, the memorandum clearly declares that merit is the one standard by which you merit [advancement] in the Air Force.”
“Yes,” Gen. Brown agreed. “As a matter of fact, if that kind of statement was not included, I would not have never signed that letter.”
Sen. Schmitt said regardless of the explanations, the memo is an example of how the Biden administration is imposing its progressive policies on the military and this is causing conservatives—the primary recruiting constituency—to back away from military service.
“This administration has infused abortion politics into our military, COVID politics into our military, DEI politics into our military. It is a cancer on the best military in the history of the world,’ Sen. Schmitt said.
“We ought to have the broadest pool of applicants and get the best and the brightest, and we ought to be recruiting in various areas to make sure we have the best and the brightest regardless of your race or your gender or your ethnicity.
“But that’s not what DEI is,” he continued. “DEI is an ideology based on cultural Marxism and, somehow, someway, we end up in a place where a general in the Air Force is advocating for racial quotas, whether it be by applicants, or the number of officers, or maybe the total unit, and I just think that’s wrong.
Tuberville Not Lifting Hold
Even if Gen. Brown is confirmed as chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, his advancement won’t go through until Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) lifts his hold on military promotions.Tuberville, elected to his first term in November 2020, announced in January 2023 that he would block the Senate’s routine unanimous consent process in advancing hundreds of DOD promotions at the same time in protest of a Pentagon policy that provides support for service members and dependents who must travel out-of-state from where based to receive an abortion.
As a result, according to the Pentagon, command-level promotions have been delayed for 265 senior officers with as many as 650 affected by the end of the year unless the hold is lifted.
As of July 10, with the retirement of Gen. David Berger, the Marine Corps does not have a commandant—a commanding officer—for the first time since 1910.
The Navy could also be leaderless soon with Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Gilday joining Milley in retirement by year’s end.
Army Gen. Randy George goes before the Senate Armed Forces Committee for his confirmation hearing as Army Chief of Staff on July 12 and a replacement for Gen. Brown as Air Force Chief of Staff are also ensnared in Tuberville’s hold.
Sen. Tuberville, in a series of recent interviews, said he will not back down from his holds, saying if the promotions were so vital to national defense, the Senate can confirm them one by one, a process the Pentagon maintains could take weeks if not months.
A member of the Senate Armed Forces Committee, Sen. Tuberville did not mention the holds during the confirmation hearing, instead focusing on his previous deliberations with Gen. Brown about internal audits within the Joint Chiefs of Staff to better manage money and avoid waste.
But Sens. Jacky Rosen (D-Nevada), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) all ripped into the former Auburn University football coach for delaying the promotions and causing upheaval for military commands and families.
“I’m the father of a United States Marine,” Sen. Kaine said. “I’m unaware of anything that the Marines have done that would warrant being punished in this way.
“I’m unaware of anything that the Marines have done, that would warrant being disrespected in this way, having their leadership hobbled in this way.
“One of my colleagues is exercising a prerogative to place a hold on 250 general and flag officer [promotions]. I’m unaware of anything that they have done that would warrant them being disrespected. or punished or delayed in their careers.
“Just because a prerogative can be exercised, doesn’t mean that it should be exercised.”
Sen. Warren said the holds that “the senator from Alabama has imposed” on promotions have military families “at a standstill. They’re unsure of enrolling their kids in school or whether they need to arrange a move across [the] country or even somewhere else around the world.
“General Brown, can you just spend a minute here and talk to us about the impact that these holds are having on our military families?”
Gen. Brown said the first impact is on “readiness and leadership” noting it is vital “for our young service members to know who is in a position of leadership, who is qualified, has the experience to be there.”
He said when one advancement is stalled, it has a residual impact down the chain of command.
“In addition to the senior officers, there’s a whole chain of events that go down to our more junior officers that have an impact. It has an impact on their progression in their career field, potentially, because if one doesn’t get promoted or move on, then they’re blocking a spot for someone else,” Gen. Brown said.
The holds are forcing the military to retain experienced officers who were planning to retire, he said.
“We have several members who have served honorably and [are] ready to retire but they’re going to, in some cases, stay with us to help us mitigate that challenge,” Gen. Brown said.
But most of all, it affects families, he said.
“Whether it’s school, whether it’s employment or the fact that they’ve already sold their home because they thought they were going to move and now we’re living in temporary quarters,” Gen. Brown said. “That creates a challenge.”
While recruiting is down, retention is up. But if the holds persist, that is not likely to continue, he said.
“We have more junior officers who now will look up and say, ‘If that’s the challenge that we have to deal with in the future, I may not want to’” stay in the military, Gen. Brown said.
As a result, he said, “We will lose talent because of those challenges.”
“I heard [Tuberville] say as he concluded his questions that if there was anything he could do to help you, he would be glad to do it,” Sen. Warren said. “What he can do to help is lift his hold before it does more damage to our country.”
While Sen. Tuberville is adamant that he won’t budge, he may be getting pressure from within the GOP chamber leadership about relenting,
Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) told The Epoch Times on July 12 that they also object to the Pentagon’s abortion travel policy and understand why Sen. Tuberville is not backing down.
“‘I’m supportive of what he’s trying to do, which is to actually get a vote” on the Senate floor on the policy, Sen. Hawley said. “I think we should make a vote on it. So, I think that’s his angle. And I think that that’s worth doing.”
“I want to legislate that issue,” Sen. Grassley agreed. The Pentagon and administration “shouldn’t be doing that. They shouldn’t be spending the taxpayers’ money” on travel for abortions.
