Response Memo

July 14, 2010

Responses to Pentagon Spokesman Geoff Morrell’s Criticism of

Servicemembers United’s Stance on Biased DADT Survey

INTRODUCTION

On Wednesday, July 07, 2010, the Department of Defense sent out a survey to 400,000 active duty
and reserve service members about issues related to the impending repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t
Tell” law. The survey was designed and administered by the research firm Westat in conjunction with
the Pentagon’s Comprehensive Review Working Group on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

On Friday, July 09, 2010, Servicemembers United issued a press release to condemn the flawed
design of this survey, including its question wording, bias-inducing content, and offensive assumptions.
Later that afternoon, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell held a press conference in which he directly
addressed Servicemembers United’s criticism of the survey and fielded numerous questions from
reporters about Servicemembers United’s assertions. Mr. Morrell went on to grant an exclusive
interview on Monday to a progressive blog during which he tried to further dispel Servicemembers
United’s criticism of the survey.

Unfortunately, the Pentagon’s responses to Servicemembers United’s criticism of the DADT survey
mirror the survey itself – flawed. What follows are line-by-line responses to Mr. Morrell’s criticism of
Servicemembers United’s stance on the biased DADT survey.

SERVICEMEMBERS UNITED RESPONSES TO PENTAGON SPOKESMAN CRITICISM

PENTAGON CLAIM: The survey was not intended for public consumption.

MR. MORRELL: “We did not intend for this survey to be shared in such a public fashion.”

SU RESPONSE: It is simply implausible to suggest that a survey sent out to 400,000 people would not
be “shared in such a public fashion.” It is also implausible to suggest that the Comprehensive Review
Working Group did not anticipate this inevitability. In fact, Servicemembers United informed the
Comprehensive Review Working Group that we considered it our duty to try to obtain a copy of the
survey and to make it available for public consumption after it was released. It would be irresponsible
to criticize aspects of the survey such as question wording and not cite the specific questions being
criticized. This was inevitable, and it was surely anticipated.

PENTAGON CLAIM: It would be irresponsible to not survey the troops about privacy, family,
and reenlistment concerns.

MR. MORRELL: “I think there are 10 in total that address those situational privacy scenarios. We think
it would be irresponsible to conduct a survey that didn’t try to address these types of things.”

SU RESPONSE: No one has suggested that the Comprehensive Review Working Group not delve
into these issues with troops. The problem is with the biased way in which the questions about these
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issues were asked; the leading, inflammatory, and limited answer choices; and the forum for asking
these types of questions. Such inquiries would have been better left to the focus groups or to a small
sample of survey respondents. A scientific sampling of the force could have been achieved with a 99%
confidence level and less than a 2% margin of error by surveying just under 4,200 troops. If the
Defense Department wanted to survey 400,000 troops on such issues, it should have ensured that the
questions being asked about these issues were not patently offensive and biased with limited and
leading answer choices.

PENTAGON CLAIM: The enormous sample size was necessary for the survey.

MR. MORRELL: “We would not be disseminating it to our forces in the numbers that we are unless we
believed it to be the best vehicle possible to get a scientific sample of the attitudes of the force.”

SU RESPONSE: This suggestion is completely false. For a population size of of nearly 3 million
(active duty plus reserve forces), the maximum number of survey participants that would have been
needed “to get a scientific sample of the attitudes of the force” with a confidence level of 99% and a
margin of error of less than 2% is just under 4,200. This would have also cost American taxpayers
significantly less and would have been more in line with the Defense Secretary’s mission to cut
excessive defense costs.

PENTAGON CLAIM: The survey is not biased.

MR. MORRELL: “Absolutely — unequivocally, I reject it as nonsense. This is the work of an incredibly
professional survey organization.”

MR. MORRELL: “I think only seven of the references use the term homosexual, and when they do use
the term homosexual, it is to elicit a yes or a no answer. It is never to elicit a subjective answer. We are
well aware that to some the word homosexual is a loaded term,”

MR. MORRELL: (Question: Why isn’t there a question that relates to the impact that DADT discharges
have had on current unit morale or cohesion?) ”I frankly don’t know. I’m sure there’s a good
explanation for it, I don’t know. I’m not armed with that information.”

SU RESPONSE: It is a well known fact that the use of the term “homosexual” in opinion polling
introduces bias, which is why the term is almost always used by fervently anti-gay organizations and
individuals in their rhetoric in contrast to the more humanizing phrase “gays and lesbians.” Even Mr.
Morrell admits to being aware that the term “homosexual” can be a “loaded term.” A February 2010
CBS/New York Times poll asked respondents, “Do you favor or oppose homosexuals serving in the
military?” While 59% of respondents favored service by “homosexuals,” that number jumped up to
70% when the phrase “gays and lesbians” was substituted for “homosexuals.” Furthermore, the
section of the survey that is about service with gays and lesbians, and hypothetical service with open
gays and lesbians, starts off with the use of the term “homosexual” multiple times.

Also, many of the questions and answer choices are leading and inherently suggestive. If the
Comprehensive Review Working Group wanted to “address these types of things” with a much larger
sample size than the focus groups and forums provided to see if the concerns expressed in those
settings would also be expressed by others, as Mr. Morrell says, then the survey should have allowed
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for open-ended responses to such questions in order to see how many times respondents took the
initiative to provide certain answers on their own rather than because they were prompted by one or
two inflammatory and leading answer choices.

Also, the omission of survey questions gauging the positive aspects of repeal will clearly bias the set
of survey results in that the results will only paint a picture of the potential problems with a change in
the law instead of a more balanced picture of the potential problems and potential benefits. The
Comprehensive Review Working Group cannot possibly judge the relative weight of reported potential
concerns if they do not have similar data on the benefits perceived by the force that may naturally
offset or counterbalance those concerns.

Also, the explanation in the survey of what “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is all about is incomplete and very
misleading. The survey tells respondents, “This law generally requires that a Service member shall
be separated if the member is found to have engaged in, or attempted to engage in, homosexual acts.
The Department of Defense is now considering changes to this policy.” Separations for engaging in,
or attempting to engage in, homosexual acts make up a very small percentage of “Don’t Ask, Don’t
Tell” discharges. Separations for homosexual admission, or simply saying that one is gay or lesbian,
make up the overwhelming majority of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” discharges, yet one would never know
this by reading the brief summary of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy provided to survey respondents.
Given the inflammatory nature of “homosexual acts” versus simply saying “I am gay,” as well as the
fact that these “acts” may be violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, such a misleading
description of the policy will also inevitably induce bias within the survey responses.

And lastly, contrary to Mr. Morrell’s suggestion, the fact that a “professional survey organization”
created the survey does not make the survey’s content unbiased. In fact, the reverse is true – the
content of the survey determines the character and aptitude of the survey creator. With respect to this
survey, Westat falls flat.

PENTAGON CLAIM: The survey is not offensive.

MR. MORRELL: ““It was not in any way, in any way, not designed to be offensive to anyone.”

SU RESPONSE: Just because the survey may not have been intentionally designed to be offensive,
or thought to be offensive by its designers, does not mean that the final product is not offensive. This
survey is highly offensive to many gay and lesbian troops who are risking their lives on foreign soil this
very minute. It is highly offensive to many gay and lesbian veterans who have sacrificed life and limb in
service to this country. And it is highly offensive to many heterosexual Americans and non-veterans
who thought that the Comprehensive Review Working Group would guard against a biased and
offensive survey about a minority group that is going out to such a large number of servicemembers.

Mr. Morrell, presumably a straight male, is not fit to judge what is offensive to a minority group of which
he is not a part. This is precisely why Servicemembers United requested multiple times to be allowed
to confidentially review the survey questions and provide feedback on what might be considered
offensive to our own community.

And lastly, could Mr. Morrell honestly say that the substitution of other minority groups in this survey
would not offend members of those groups? Would the Department of Defense ever ask 400,000
servicemembers if they feel that they might need to “discuss how we expect each other to behave and
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conduct ourselves” if they are assigned to a room or tent with a black or Jewish servicemember? Or
would troops ever be asked if their family members would approve of their enlistment or continued
service if known Muslims would be working beside them? We think not.

PENTAGON CLAIM: The Pentagon has been clear that it understands the repeal of DADT to be
a matter of when and how, not if or whether.

MR. MORRELL: “It is abundantly clear to this working group that their marching orders from the Sec.
of Def. are to determine how to implement a repeal of DADT. Their job is not to determine whether or
not the force wishes a repeal to take place or not to take place.”

SU RESPONSE: This may be abundantly clear to the individual members of the Comprehensive
Review Working Group, but the messages to Congress and the media have been distinctly different
than the message to the military community. Since members of the military community are also media
consumers, and since members of the general public also have access to the messages conveyed to
the military community, the mixed messages have been quite confusing.

In the survey alone, the phrase “If ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ is repealed…” appears no less than 17 times.
Admiral Mullen also tried to encourage participation in the survey by telling troops that repeal is “not a
done deal.” Yet both Admiral Mullen and Secretary Gates have repeatedly told Congress and the
media that they understand that repeal (and the study) is not a matter of if or whether, but how and
when.

PENTAGON CLAIM: You should not be concerned about negative results, since the purpose is
just for us to use the results to figure out how to overcome them.

MR. MORRELL: “Well we’re gonna have to figure out how we overcome that. Whether it’s through
additional training or education or recruiting techniques – I can’t tell you what the working group may
or may not come up with. This is not in any way intended for us to find potential landmines that would
cause us not to proceed with a repeal, but rather is to edify us about the kinds of challenges
associated with repeal that would need to be dealt with post-repeal. I guess what I don’t understand
here is why you and some of these others who are writing on this issue can’t take what we say at face
value.”

SU RESPONSE: It would be incredibly naïve to think that negative results would not be used and
abused by opportunistic politicians, activists, and pundits to try to derail or delay this inevitable policy
change. If the Department of Defense really wanted to use these results solely for internal planning
purposes, it would have conducted this study in a much less public manner and sent this survey out to
a more scientifically appropriate sample size.

PENTAGON CLAIM: Not surveying in the manner we did would be tantamount to ignoring the
concerns of the troops about this policy change.

MR. MORRELL: “What do you want us to do? Do you want us to put our head in the sand and ignore
concerns that have been voiced to us by the force? And so that when we are charged with
implementing the repeal, we don’t have any of the information necessary to alleviate or mitigate some
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of these problems? It is better for us to ask some of these questions up front in as candid a manner as
possible, to get as much information as possible, so we are prepared for this eventuality. It would be
irresponsible of us to do otherwise.”

SU RESPONSE: No, Mr. Morrell. We, the military community, and the American public all expect the
Defense Department to study internal issues internally; ask appropriate questions in non-offensive
ways with unbiased survey instruments and scientifically appropriate sample sizes; and save the most
inflammatory questions, if they must be asked, for private focus groups or much smaller sample
populations. It would be irresponsible for you to do otherwise.

PENTAGON CLAIM: The Westat survey only cost $850,000, not $4.4 million.

MR. MORRELL: (paraphrased from Wonk Room interview) “The Department is also disputing SU’s
claim that it ‘paid the research firm Westat the outrageous sum of $4.4 million to design and administer
an email-based survey,’ insisting that the true cost is closer to $850,000.”

SU RESPONSE: This “clarification” directly contradicts what Mr. Morrell stated during Friday’s press
conference about Servicemembers United’s criticism of the survey content. During that event, Mr.
Morrell was asked directly by Jen DiMascio of Politico, “What’s the cost of the survey?” to which Mr.
Morrell responded, “It cost about $4.5 million.” Mr. Morrell went on to stress that the survey is “costing
us an extraordinary sum of money. It’s taking an extraordinary amount of time and manpower, and it
deals with an extraordinarily important issue to this department, to this secretary, and to the president
of the United States.”

The attempt by Mr. Morrell to shave off the bulk of the survey contract cost by referring to only a
narrow part of that survey contract and claiming that this small part only cost $850,000 is
disingenuous. Even if the the survey contract with Westat was only for $850,000, that’s still an
enormous sum and a huge waste of taxpayer money. Regardless, the entire survey contract with
Westat, including support, analysis, etc., did cost over $4.4 million, as Servicemembers United
originally said and as Mr. Morrell confirmed on Friday.

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