Ret. Lt. Col. Bob Alexander stayed closeted within the Air Force for 20 years due to the “don’t ask, don’t tell” coverage. He got here out when the coverage ended, and when he retired, he determined to assist those that weren’t discharged honorably due to their sexual orientation. He resides in Washington D.C., and works as a cybersecurity legal professional.

Keren Carrión/NPR

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Keren Carrión/NPR

Ret. Lt. Col. Bob Alexander stayed closeted within the Air Force for 20 years due to the “don’t ask, don’t tell” coverage. He got here out when the coverage ended, and when he retired, he determined to assist those that weren’t discharged honorably due to their sexual orientation. He resides in Washington D.C., and works as a cybersecurity legal professional.

Keren Carrión/NPR

Bob Alexander joined the Air Force in 1990, planning to make it his profession. He knew there was an enormous situation to take care of: Alexander was beginning to query his sexual orientation. At the time, homosexual troops weren’t allowed within the navy. In truth, the ban would not be lifted for one more twenty years.

“I just decided that I would just follow the rules in terms of not acting on my sexuality. Which meant that for the first 12, 14 years I was alone, celibate, not dating,” he says.

Around the identical time Stephan Steffanides joined the Navy, similar to his father, uncle, grandfather and nice uncle, amongst others.

“My family’s been serving this country for all of the last century,” Steffanides says.

He served aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, stationed at Norfolk, Va. But two years into his enlistment, Steffanides obtained noticed at a homosexual bar close to his base.

“They cut my locker open and found some gay magazines,” he says. Not solely was it towards the navy rules, homosexual intercourse was nonetheless illegal in Virginia, and plenty of different states.

“They threw me in the brig, put me on bread and water — it was humiliating –for being gay,” says Steffanides.

Advocates estimate that 114,000 troops have been pushed out of the service over the a long time on account of their sexual orientation, typically with a less-than-honorable discharge. That means no computerized VA advantages or free VA well being care. It makes getting a civilian job powerful as a result of employers typically ask about navy service. Many vets discover it simpler to omit that they served moderately than clarify an other-than-honorable discharge. That’s what Steffanides obtained.

And to make issues worse, that is how he was immediately outed to his household.

“They wanted nothing to do with me. It was all arguments that destroyed my family life,” he says.

“I turned to drugs and alcohol as soon as I got out of the Navy, and within a couple of years I was homeless and living in the streets. I spent 20 years in the streets,” says Steffanides.

Robert Alexander getting his 2nd lieutenant bars pinned by his dad and mom at his commissioning.

Bob Alexander

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Bob Alexander

Robert Alexander getting his 2nd lieutenant bars pinned by his dad and mom at his commissioning.

Bob Alexander

Meanwhile, Bob Alexander spent these 20 years rising via the ranks.

In 1993 President Bill Clinton tried to finish the ban, however landed as a substitute on a coverage often called “don’t ask, don’t tell.” As lengthy as they stored it secret, homosexual and lesbian troops might serve.

“Being closeted under ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ was like being a ghost at your own funeral. Being trapped there and having to listen to people say not very nice things about you, right?” Alexander says.

Critics say “don’t ask, don’t tell” was a false compromise. About 14,000 folks have been kicked out of the navy for his or her sexual orientation throughout the 17 years it was enforced. Some troops felt like they’d been ordered to lie, says Alexander.

“The way I handled it mostly was I moved a lot. I never stayed anywhere long enough for people to really get to know me too well,” he says.

At least twice he almost obtained caught. Rumors sprouted about how he wasn’t relationship girls or had reported on others for utilizing homophobic slurs. Alexander would leap on the subsequent likelihood to maneuver, even when it wasn’t nice for his profession. One of these jumps occurred close to the monetary disaster of 2008; he could not promote his home and needed to stroll away from the mortgage.

“In the 22 years I was in the military, I think I had 11 separate permanent duty assignments, and that’s not including deployments,” he mentioned.

Then on Sept. 20, 2011, after a long campaign by activists, the Obama administration ended the ban. In the years since, the combination of homosexual and lesbian troops has been heralded as an enormous success with no results on unit cohesion or fight readiness, according to the Pentagon. At the time it was uncharted territory, and Alexander, by then a lieutenant colonel, sat in a room filled with senior officers speaking about easy methods to deal with homosexual service members.

“I said, you know what, ‘I’m a gay service member,’ ” he mentioned. ” ‘Send them to me and I will handle it.’ And that’s how I came out.”

For the remainder of the day, Alexander says, colleagues got here as much as congratulate him on his braveness and his sacrifice over a long time. Though he’d already reached his 20-year mark for full retirement, Alexander ended up staying one other 12 months and a half.

“The rest of my time in the military was absolutely exceptional. These folks were wonderful, once the fear was gone, once the unknown was unmasked,” he mentioned. “After everything I’d been through, that validation in the end was very meaningful.”

Bob Alexander, a retired lieutenant colonel within the U.S. Air Force, holds up a photograph of when he was enlisted.

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Bob Alexander, a retired lieutenant colonel within the U.S. Air Force, holds up a photograph of when he was enlisted.

Keren Carríon/NPR

Alexander knew that validation was lacking for untold numbers of different veterans, so he then began a second profession: as a lawyer.

Alexander’s first venture was with the San Francisco-based veterans charity Swords to Plowshares, making an attempt to assist homosexual veterans with other-than-honorable discharges. He simply needed to discover them.

“I put up flyers all over the Bay Area in the gay bars, places I knew that these LGBTQ veterans would frequent. And I got nothing, no response at all,” he mentioned.

The causes for which can be sophisticated. Troops have been typically kicked out with euphemistic expenses like “violation of an order” or “indecent behavior.” So it is arduous to say precisely what number of veterans have been expelled and what number of may nonetheless be alive — and with out the advantages they’re due.

A Pentagon spokesperson mentioned the navy has granted 90% of functions to discharge evaluate boards. But the overall determine granted is 1,375, as of March 2023 – a tiny fraction of the quantity advocates imagine are on the market.

Besides the prolonged means of a navy discharge evaluate board, there is a a lot less complicated path. With most other-than-honorable discharges, the VA can “characterize” a veteran’s discharge as honorable for VA well being care and most advantages (excluding the GI Bill dwelling mortgage and schooling funds.)

“Bottom line, if you’re a veteran or survivor or family member who was impacted by ‘don’t ask, don’t tell,’ come to VA. We’re going to do everything in our power to get you the benefits you’ve earned and so richly deserve,” says Sue Fulton, a VA assistant secretary.

The VA says it has modified the “character of discharge” to honorable for 73% of veterans who apply. But VA would not monitor the variety of people who concerned “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

The Pentagon advised NPR it has achieved in depth outreach within the years following repeal. But a number of present and former protection officers mentioned that the Pentagon is uniquely capable of take a extra proactive strategy – a deep dive via navy data to seek out folks and inform them of the chance to assert their advantages.

That’s unlikely within the present political local weather although. The Pentagon was pushed to ban drag shows on navy bases, the VA has been criticized for flying pride flags, and a few republicans in Congress are calling the U.S. navy “woke” and making an attempt to restrict all military transgender care and diversity initiatives.

Some vets do not need to be discovered.

There’s one other complication to repairing the injury achieved to veterans underneath “don’t ask, don’t tell” and earlier bans on LGB troops: Some vets do not need to be discovered. They could by no means have advised their households. For many, revisiting the previous is traumatic.

Bob Alexander discovered this in his early makes an attempt.

Alexander spent hours at Pride occasions in San Francisco and Oakland, Calif., handing out his flyers, and he realized even the phrase “veteran” might need been off placing.

“They probably didn’t even look at the flyers. Since they were told by the military, they were told by the VA, told by society that they were not veterans,” he says .

Eventually, he seemed the place the necessity was most determined — among the many homeless. And that is the place he met Stephan Steffanides, 20 years since his discharge from the Navy for being homosexual.

“I was in the street, living in the gutter, literally behind a trash can,” says Steffanides.

Stephan Steffanides, who served aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln stationed at Norfolk, Va., is among the veterans Alexander helped.

Stephan Steffanides

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Stephan Steffanides

Steffanides had no concept the coverage had modified in 2011, and that he was now eligible for VA housing and well being care and incapacity. Anything involving the navy made him anxious. When he noticed Alexander’s sales space at a homelessness service honest, his boyfriend needed to stroll him there.

“I think Stephan had a panic attack,” Alexander says. “Just approaching a nonprofit veteran service organization was traumatic for him.”

Steffanides was shocked when Alexander and his colleagues mentioned they may assist.

“They told me, ‘You know what? We don’t leave our wounded on the battlefield. You served your country for two years and regardless of your discharge, we don’t want to see you suffering,’ ” says Steffanides.

Upgrading Steffanides’ paperwork with the Pentagon remains to be ongoing, however the course of with the VA was achieved in only a matter of months.

“It was a simple letter from them saying … ‘For the purposes of VA, we find your service to be honorable,’ ” says Alexander. “Just that acknowledgement from the VA that he’s a veteran was like a light shown down on him.”

“It was spiritual for me,” says Steffanides. “I was so, so proud. And it inspired me to be of service to others.”

Steffanides now runs a assist group in San Francisco for LGBTQ veterans, and data their oral histories.

“I can continue to be the person that I wanted to be when I was much younger and I had joined the service to serve my country. There’s still ways I can do that,” he mentioned.