Erie County Health Department Update ( 3.26.20 )

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth blocked the promotions of at least seven Navy officers hand-picked by a board of senior admirals, removing all women and most minority candidates from the list of nominees for promotions.

The intervention left a slate of 22 one-star admiral nominees that includes no women, despite females making up roughly 21 percent of the active-duty Navy, and only two nonwhite officers, despite racial minorities accounting for approximately 38 percent of the force, reported the New York Times.

At least two of the removed officers are women, two are Black men, and three are white men.

Four current and former defense officials, speaking anonymously to discuss sensitive personnel matters, said Hegseth's actions are highly unusual and appear to breach Pentagon rules, which permit the defense secretary to remove officers from promotion lists only when new information raises specific questions about their fitness to serve — not on ideological grounds.

Internal records suggest some officers were targeted because their names appeared on a website devoted to identifying "woke" military personnel, with infractions as minor as having served as a diversity liaison officer two decades ago. One highly regarded officer — a nuclear-trained surface warfare officer and former aide to a four-star admiral — was pulled from the list shortly after her name surfaced on the site for that decades-old role.

Hegseth also pushed senior Navy officials to place Capt. William Francis Jr., a Navy SEAL who serves as Hegseth’s special assistant, on the one-star list, but his lack of command experience made him ineligible for promotion and he was not selected, according to current and former Navy officials.

Since taking office, Hegseth has fired or sidelined nearly three dozen senior officers. Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, noted in recent Senate testimony that nearly 60 percent of the senior officers Hegseth has dismissed are female or Black — a group that currently makes up fewer than 20 percent of all generals and admirals.

Among those previously pushed out were General Charles Q. Brown Jr., the second African American to chair the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman ever to lead the Navy.

Hegseth has repeatedly declined to explain individual dismissals or removals, telling lawmakers he does not discuss such matters "out of respect for those officers" while speaking broadly of correcting years of what he called "gender and demographic engineering."

The Pentagon denied that race or gender played any role in promotion decisions, and the Navy declined to comment.

Spencer Pratt’s (R) seemingly cozy lead on Los Angeles city council member Nithya Raman (D) in the city’s mayoral race has been erased.

The post Nithya Raman Leapfrogs Spencer Pratt, Projected to Advance in LA Mayor’s Race first appeared on Mediaite.

Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) said he thinks progressive influencer Hasan Piker should be banned from the United States after the United Kingdom blocked his visit with fellow commentator and his uncle, Cenk Uygur, TMZ reported on Wednesday.

The MAGA lawmaker was walking on Capitol Hill when a TMZ reporter asked Fine to comment on Piker's entry to the country being revoked over the weekend. The two were scheduled to speak at the SXSW London Festival but were turned away "because of their criticism of Israel," The BBC reported.

"Well I don't think he should be allowed into America, so I think that's a good start," Fine said.

The TMZ reporter responded and asked Fine, "What about freedom of speech?"

"People have freedom of speech but I think when you're a terrorist you should be held responsible for that," Fine said. "And I think he's clearly a supporter of terror. He's a walking billboard for the problem of birth tourism. He was brought here by his Turkish family, they had him, then they took him home, made him hate America, then sent him in to torment us. The guy's a horrible human being and I wouldn't let him into my country if it was up to me, so I don't blame them."

Piker, who is an American citizen, has condemned Islamophobia and been an outspoken critic of MAGA and the Trump administration. He has a large social media following, primarily through streaming on Twitch and weighing in on political topics. He frequently discusses social issues and engages in debates with commentators across the political spectrum.

The reporter pushed back again and suggested that "banning him from a country is [a] pretty crazy step for someone who is expressing his opinion."

"And by the way, they're allowed to do that," Fine said.

When the reporter pressed the Republican again on freedom of speech, he repeated his talking point.

"He promotes Muslim terror, so I think they're making the right decision," said Fine, making the unsubstantiated claim. "I'm surprised they did it but I think they did the right thing."