Unwed Couples to Get Military Benefits — Only If They’re Gay
Outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has issued a directive stating that certain military benefits formerly reserved for married couples will now be extended to unmarried partners — but only if they’re same-sex partners.
Heterosexual unmarried partners do not qualify for the benefits.
Panetta issued his directive in a memorandum to the secretaries of the military departments and the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness.
Citing the repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law, Panetta states: “Discrimination based on sexual orientation no longer has a place in the military.”
The memorandum continues: “At the direction of the President, the Department has conducted a careful and deliberative review of the benefits currently provided to the families of Service members. We have now identified additional family member and dependent benefits that we can lawfully provide to same-sex domestic partners of Military Service members and their children through changes in Department of Defense policies and regulations.
“These benefits shall be extended to the same-sex domestic partners and, where applicable, children of same-sex domestic partners, once the Service member and their same-sex domestic partner have signed a declaration attesting to the existence of their committed relationship.”
The declaration defines a “domestic partner” as a “person in a domestic partnership with a Service member of the same sex,” and a “domestic partnership” as a “committed relationship between two adults, of the same sex, that meets all of the requirements below.”
Among those requirements, neither of the partners can be “married, joined in a civil union with, or domestic partners with anyone else,” and the partners intend to remain in a committed relationship “indefinitely.”
Among the benefits the Pentagon will now give to same-sex domestic partners but not to heterosexual unwed couples are disability and death compensation, legal assistance, some travel on Department of Defense aircraft, commissary privileges, welfare and recreation programs, emergency leave, and access to a “sexual assault counseling program.”
Panetta’s memorandum also states that because of the Defense of Marriage Act, the Defense Department cannot extend all of the benefits given to married couples to unmarried same-sex domestic partners, including healthcare and housing allowances.
But it adds: “In the event that the Defense of Marriage Act is no longer applicable to the Department of Defense, it will be the policy of the Department to construe the words ‘spouse’ and ‘marriage’ without regard to sexual orientation, and married couples, irrespective of sexual orientation, will be granted full military benefits.”
