DoD official Michael Dominguez booted from sex assault hearing

DoD official booted from sex assault hearing

By William H. McMichael - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Jul 31, 2008 14:19:16 EDT

The Pentagon’s No. 2 personnel and readiness official was admonished and dismissed from a House subcommittee hearing on sexual assault in the military Thursday after admitting that he had directed a key subordinate not to appear.

“Mr. Dominguez, I notice that Dr. Kaye Whitley is not in her chair,” said Rep. John Tierney, D-Mass., and chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee’s national security and foreign affairs panel. “Is it under your direction that she has not shown for testimony this morning?”

“Ah, yes sir,” replied Michael Dominguez, principal deputy under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness.

“Do you have an executive privilege to assert?” asked Tierney.

“Ah, no sir,” Dominguez replied.

“Mr. Dominguez, this is an oversight hearing,” Tierney said. “It’s an oversight hearing on sexual assault in the military. As such, we thought it was proper to hear from the director of the Defense Department’s Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office. ... Inexplicably, the Defense Department — and you, apparently — have resisted.”

Tierney said Whitley would be subpoenaed and that Dominguez’s decision showed disrespect to the two women who had testified moments earleir — one a rape victim, one a rape/murder victim’s mother — as well as other victims and the subcommittee itself.
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