Public service, along with these other television providers, giving you a front row seat to democracy. Up next, a discussion on civil rights, diversity and inclusion in the military and talk about challenges ahead for the branches, affirmative action policies of the nations military academies in recruitment and retention. The Truman LibraryInstitute Event last about an hour. Okay, good morning. Thank you all for being here. Im going to keep it super short so that we can get to the conversation. Of so just a few things. One, i am thrilled to be part of this event and to recognize the courage of president truman to sign executive order 9981. An order, frankly, that is the only reason i can take this stage today as a retired navy guy. But even more importantly, its the personal growth, trumans personal growth over his lifetime. Ive worked in the world of political science, and were talking lots about hyperpartisanship and polarization and how people are dug in on their positions. Truman had the opportunity to do that, and he chose the more difficult, more american path of growing. And, yes, the work continues. This order was signed in 1948. If you tried to be, if you wanted to be an officer9 in the navy, very difficult even after the order was signed. When i went on my first deployment in 199, it was an all allmale ship, no women allowed. My second deployment women were only to be officers, and they refitted the ship to allow for female sailors to be onboard. That was 2001. My mother graduated from high school in 1970. 16 years after brown v. Board, she was of valedictorian of her segregated high school in blakely, georgia. So just because legislation, Supreme Court sessions, executive orders are signed and come down to the country does not mean changes happens overnight. It requires energy, effort, passion, and it requires the next generation to pick up the baton and not let the changes or the progress weve achieved fall to the side. As we say in the navy, not pick up the baton, but e got the watch. We have the watch for our democracy. We have the watch for the diversity that we bring, the strength that we bring to our nation and to the world. And so to have this conversation, ive god a few of my good friends here, and i want to make sure i introduce them in order. First, we have retire navy captain cynthia behalfly, then retired Army Lieutenant general Jason Dempsey and secretary of the department of Veterans Affairs, anthony woods, tony woods. Please. [applause]. [applause] all right. So were going to power through some questions here to sort of keep us on time. And the first question i want to ask is how each of these folks came to the work of inclusion, the military and thinking about the future of the country. And first i want to ask captain mackrey about her life growing up, her father, her grandfather and how their story contributed to how her military career ended up or went. Thank you, ted. So is i, my story is like everybody else, my journeys not linear. But one of the the things i wanted to make sure that i brought up was that before executive order 9981 there was executive order 9066 which resulted in the interment of 120,000 japaneseamericans, many of whom were actually u. S. Citizens by birth. And so in addition, among those e people that were actually arrested can and put in u. S. Prisoner of war camps was my grandfather who was in camp livingston, louisiana, for the duration most of the war and then was paroled in march of 1944 and reunited with his family at camp jerome, arkansas, which was one of the ten war relocation camps. My dad then the family then return ared after the war back to hawaii. Where my dad got a bachelors degree but was drafted in 951 for the korean war 1951. Before the mccarran act in 1952 restore his birthright citizenship. So, again, these are parts of the history that i think many people either dont realize or dont remember or were never taught. And so my dad went on to the university of minnesota where i was born to get a ph. D. In plant genetics and ended up serving humanity throughout the world for his entire career as a international agronomies. Im the middle of five kids, born in st. Paul, minnesota. Which always, you know, puzzles me when people can me where im from, you know, where i learned how to speak english [laughter] and more recently, why dont i go back where im from. [laughter] and so, but those are things that, you know, we, or you know, endure as part of what we call or what have been labeled as microaggressions that make us feel like we dont belong. So my, the experience since im the middle of five kids, of course, everybody was japaneseamerican, right . Everybody expected to go to college. I didnt even know you could have a job without a college degree. [laughter] and i, there was no money. So i joined the navy to go to med school. And, by the way, you know, when youre 3 years old and you tell your japaneseamerican father that youre going to be a doctor, guess what you wind up being . A doctor, right in. [laughter] so i had to i was not the smartest student, but with i had an interesting life because i had livinged overseas, worked in a lend proprocity hospital in pakistan. I mean, who else did that among applicants for medical school in 1979 . So i joined the navy in 1979, and like ted said, who knew that we couldnt be on ships, right . Who knew that we couldnt, we didnt is have the freedom to choose where we wanted to go. I wanted to be an or the periodic surgeon. I played College Soccer in 1975 on the mens team, and i wanted to be an orthopedic surgeon. Those doors were not open in the military at the tame. At the time. I did not have the, you know, all of the choices that i wanted, but i leveraged the ones that i had and, ultimately, ended up we ended up publishing a paper about how Health Disparities, which was in 1990s, late 900s, Health Disparities actually the were killing people. Both systemic mismatch between providers and patients culturally, you know, race, identity, etc. , contributed to the lack to poorer outcomes among minority women for one of the most pref if lent worldwide cancers, cervical cancer. So we published that paper k and that launched me on my journey to improve diversity in Higher Education by any means that i could. And the navy was, was very receptive to that in the late 90s, early 2000s and, i ultimately, i built my portfolio around improving diversity in Higher Education. Yeah. Thank you. And, i mean, to all those who say learning the tough history of our country will dissuade people from serving . If no. No, it wont. People who love this country will serve the country no the matter the history and, again, this panel is proof of that. Jason has an interesting story about the man who now is the militaries play upstairs is now named after colin powell, so ill turn it over to jason for his journey from cadet all the way through to his retirement, talking about inclusion and the role of diversity. Thank you, ted. So i was a military brat as many of us are nowadays who join the army. And my formative experience in the military was defined by the early 90s. Thats when i decided to put on the uniform. And there were two things that define Race Relations in the military in the 90s or at least the perceptions of Race Relations in the 90s. The first was the first goal four, if you remember, seen as an exorcism of all the demons of vietnam. Not just our battlefield failures, but included the racial strife thatted had rocked the military through the late 60s and early 70s. The second thing was, well, we had general powell appointed as the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. And if that was an indicator at least to a lot of people, okay, the seniorranked person in the military is a black general. Were done with race. I was fortunate prior to commissioning to go intern as a speech writer for general powell, and there are a couple things that really opened my eyes about those jenner perceptions about race in the general perceptions about race in the military at the time. The first was the letters. General powell received more letters than any chairman had previously and probably any chairman has since. And it was young kids, it was people getting ready to commission. Everybody wanted him to come and see them graduate from basic training. Hay wanted him at their commissioning. They wanted to ask him advice about joining the military, and it showed what a dearth of representation there had been up to that point. That hunger for seeing somebody like yourself as you make this leap into this really hard profession. The second thing i was tasked with was researching and drafting what became his dedication speech or speech at the dedication of Buffalo Soldiers monument. And i, you knowing trucked my way down to the pentagon library. It was the first time i really dug into the history of what had happened to africanamericans in the armed forces. And seeing the just outright brutality, the criminality, the discrimination they faced year after year after year, and more importantly it was done by gentlemen that we had otherwise been caught to venerate as heros. And the fact that we excluded that from how we taught history indicated that we had some real blind spots in how we were going to approach this issue. You know, and as i went and left and got in the army, e realized i realized, yoke okay, the goal was really, it wasnt about the end of race, it was, frankly, it was our Mission Accomplished moment on race. It was not realizing we still had a long, long way to go, you know . We certainly hadnt exorcised our inability to avoid catastrophic failure in a counterinsurgency war, but we also hadnt gotten past the challenges we were facing on racial and and ethnic integration. And fast forward, i was able several years later the army sent me to go teach at west point, and i was able to as part of my doctoral degree do a survey of the social and Political Attitudes of all ranks of the United States army. And i asked that classic question, do you think theres more or less discrimination in the military than in society in and conventional wisdom was with, of course, the militarys wonderful. But when i looked, 80 of army officer at the time, unfortunately still are in the senior ranks, are predominantly white males. And if you look at the way they answer that question, 88 said, of course, theres less discrimination in the military than in society. But when you broke it down by race, it was a different story. No matter what rank they were, enlisted, junior officers, even senior officers, if they were not white, their answer was maybe. Less than 50 said there was less crimination if mt. Militarn the military than in society across all those minority demographics, across all ranks. And and so if you think about what that means for the way conversations take place about race in the military, i would just say imagine, you know, two middleaged white guys alone in a Conference Room saying, hey, jim, are you racist . And how do you overcome those issues that prevent these conversations spurt its amazing to hear you talk about power. After obama was elected with the national postracial moment in the military had that mom a couple decades earlier with powell and realized as a nation in a postracial. Theres work to be done. Kori, she worked on the base read any commission so i would love for her to talk about that experience and the reminder that the past is always with us unless we take it on, take it out and do something about it. Spurt it was a privilege to enter Michelle Howards leadership and i think a lot of the reason quite sincerely a lot of the reason there hasnt been more pushback to exchange that the commission ushered in was the great and excellent leadership at all how it brought to the process that was inclusive, that was consulted to job that helped bring communities along. I have to tell you though it was genuinely shocking to realize that the department of defense has 10,000 properties named for people who voluntarily serve in the confederacy. We renamed or recommended the renaming of the ten big army bases and two capital ships, but 10,000 properties named for people serve in the confederacy. Id like to mention two things. First one of the most egregious properties for me was until this year at the United States military academy at west point there was a 20foot high portrait of robert e. Lee in his confederate uniform with a black slave holding his horse. That was given by the daughters of the confederacy in 1954, soon after black cadets started matriculating at west point that hung in the Cadet Library until this year. The second thing i want to say is just to briefly illustrate one of the soldiers for whom one of the bases was renamed, William Henry johnson, who fought in world war i. He was an american soldier. Because the American Army would not permit blacks to serve in combat because they did not want them to get the social acceptance of that service, his unit Harlem Health fighters, actually thought attached to a fridge unit he was the First American soldier awarded the and subsequently the medal of honor. And it is now renamed for him. A while back. [applause] i suspect this will be a political football of sorts. What we named them and sort of that vein, so the conversation is not over even with the amazing amazing work of the commission of work will need to be defended will require our support. Lets go to secretary woods. We go back a decade or so, so got to get used as a your friends become important. You have to follow the time. So tony returned serve in the army returned from iraq and gets an appointment to harvard and everything changes, id love for you to talk about your journey. Thank you very much and thank you for organizing this. I come to this work first and foremost the secondgrade set of air force veterans. S executive order 9881 really shape the Family Business so to speak in just a smidgen so many folks and served come from families who have examples of people serve as will. That animates our think about this work and how i think about my service. For me raised by a single mom who worked as a housekeeper, west point became an opportunity out, completely change the trajectory of my life getting a shot at the middle class. That was exceptionally important to me to get an opportunity to serve in exchange for education to. Unfortunately after my two deployments that after going to harvard my career was interrupted because i chose to be honest about who i was in my Sexual Orientation period this is at the time dont ask, dont tell was still very much the law of the land and resulted in immediate discharge from the military. I did work on advocating for repeal of dont ask, dont tell was so many others and obviously was very excited to see when that law went away. Its pretty rare in life people who advocate for something also did immediately get to enjoy the fruits of that labor. Just a couple years after that i was able to rejoin the military and where i still served in the Army Reserves today, i made a site to the pentagon on the joint staff that i bring to this work our lives think about lgbt q Service Members and the acceptance and inclusion they have as they serve to deeper and finally to your point i have the privilege of serving in the more administration in maryland as secretary of Veterans Affairs but we have about 360,000 veterans who live in maryland here its an exceptionally diverse veteran population. One of the things i have learned a fair amount about overtime whether serving on Advisory Board for the u. S. Department of Veterans Affairs is that the fact we have very different conception and image of what it means to be a better has actual real outcomes and impacts on the level at which veterans consume the benefits they have earned women, for example, are far less likely to take advantage of the benefits they have erred. If you are a woman you typically will take 40 will take advantage of one benefit they have erred. Thats leaving a tremendous amount of resources on the table because more often than not will be think of what a veteran and its a person who was a white straight male concert in the combat arms wrote on the front lines overseas. That perception has very real impacts right now a black veteran who applies or files a claim related to posttraumatic stress disorder far less likely to have the claims accepted that a white veterans thinking about disparities and how inclusion plays out in an exceptionally diverse that is my was mye something very important. Governor more, his governing philosophies is leave no one behind her i think about who are my most marginalized or unrepresented veterans who have to put first week we are thinking about the work we have to do. Spurt weve talked about i think all the stories connect the past to present service and present challenges to thinking about the next set of challenges what does this look like . What are the gen z kids think about what theyre going to do after high school or after college, is a military one of the options what the next set of exclusion challenges that will require the encourage that truly demonstrated that will be required of us . This is an open question but once the Frontier West this is not to suggest we have solved race and ethnicity or Sexual Orientation is in the military but we do from American History that the set of problems is not, has not been bounded, that it can grow. What are the next challenges . Id love to the future of inclusion in the military, what are the successes we can look forward to as well as the challenges . Sort of an open question to the group here. Ill take a shot at that. I think both present and continued future challenges is socializing the appreciation that inclusiveness is what makes for