In recent congressional hearings, some top U.S. military brass debated the effectiveness of a moratorium on military discharges related to the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT) policy. “I would recommend against it, it would complicate the whole process … implementing while we were studying it,” Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey said. However, Army Secretary John McHugh said today that the Department of Defense has basically implemented a de facto moratorium on discharges as the Army working group considers its review of the DADT. He said that while Defense Secretary Robert Gates hasn’t explicitly stated so, it was a “reasonable assumption” to make. He added that although several active-duty servicemembers have told him they are gay, he hasn’t taken any action:

“The secretary of the Army is probably not going to go out and initiate an action against an individual soldier who, in the conversation about how do you feel about ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ identified themselves as gay,” McHugh said during a breakfast with reporters. “I just thought it would be counterproductive … in engaging the force to take disciplinary action against someone who had spoken to me openly and honestly.”

McHugh himself agreed with Casey last month during the hearings, saying that “any number of current cases would be greatly complicated” by a moratorium. Top Democrats, who support repealing DADT, have questioned whether a review of the policy would be effective if discharges were to continue. They have also signaled their willingness to draft a legislative solution should the problem remain unaddressed.

– Nick McClellan

After President Obama named Rep. John McHugh (R-NY) as his nominee for Secretary of the Army, progressives have been working to better understand McHugh’s current position on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the ban on gays serving openly in the military. While McHugh still intends to refrain from publicizing his own personal view on the issue until his confirmation hearings, yesterday in an interview with Roll Call, he hinted that he believes it’s time to repeal the ban:

“I have no interest as either a Member of Congress or as … secretary of the Army to exclude by some categorization a group of people otherwise qualified to serve,” McHugh told Roll Call.

He noted that the Armed Services Committee has not considered the policy “in any formal way” since 1993. In the meantime, “certainly, the recruiting-age population’s views have changed on that whole matter,” he said.

Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said on Tuesday that McHugh shared Obama’s commitment to repealing the ban.