(GayWebSource.com – Gay News & Press Network) – Posted by Michael Lamb – Echelon Magazine
“It’s unconscionable that legally married LGBT veterans are still being denied their full veterans benefits if they happen to live in a state that doesn’t respect their marriage. These are earned federal benefits, not benefits from the state.”
On the eve of Veterans Day, the American Military Partner Association, the nation’s largest organization for the partners, spouses, families, and allies of America’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) service members and veterans, once again called on the Department of Veterans Affairs to immediately begin granting full and equal benefits to legally married LGBT veterans and their spouses.
“This is completely unacceptable and must be fixed now,” said Gene Silvestri, a U.S. Army veteran and AMPA’s Veterans Affairs Coordinator. “It’s unconscionable that legally married LGBT veterans are still being denied their full veterans benefits if they happen to live in a state that doesn’t respect their marriage. These are earned federal benefits, not benefits from the state.”
“How much longer do these families have to wait for the benefits they’ve sacrificed for and earned serving our nation?” asked Ashley Broadway, spouse of a U.S. Army officer and AMPA’s Director of Family Readiness. “More importantly, why does no one seem to care that these families are being treated differently? Where are the Members of Congress who are supposedly champions of our veterans and their families?”
Even after the fall of the Defense of Marriage Act that prevented the federal government’s recognition of same-sex marriages, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is still following discriminatory language in Title 38 section 103c when determining the validity of marriages for veteran benefits purposes. As service members transition from active duty, same-sex couples in non-marriage equality states are denied full and equal access to many earned veterans’ benefits from the VA. Legally married active duty service members living in non-marriage equality states are also denied access to the full backing of VA home loans.
In August, AMPA filed a lawsuit against the Secretary of the VA challenging the VA’s regulations. The petition filed in the Federal Circuit Court argues that the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Windsor striking down Section 3 of DOMA specifically flagged as unconstitutional the deprivation of veterans benefits to same-sex spouses. The VA should not rely on discriminatory state marriage bans that have been declared unconstitutional by federal courts far and wide throughout the country as the basis to deny these spousal benefits now. The petition further states, “Having weathered the federal government’s past, longstanding discrimination against them, lesbian and gay veterans and their families find themselves once again deprived of equal rights and earned benefits by the government they served and the nation for which they sacrificed.”
The challenge is now pending in the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit [AMPA v. McDonald, No. 14-7121 (Fed. Cir. 2014)].
For more information about the American Military Partner Association and LGBT military spouses and their families, please visit our home on the web at www.MilitaryPartners.org.
The American Military Partner Association is the nation’s largest organization for the partners, spouses, and families of America’s LGBT service members and veterans. Founded and led by same-sex military partners in 2009 as the Campaign for Military Partners, AMPA has grown to over 30,000 members and supporters and is committed to education, advocacy, and support for our “modern military families.”
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