Exclusive: Rep. Mike Waltz to Lead Heritage Foundation Panel on Combating Wokeness in the Military

Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL), an Army Green Beret, is chairing a think-tank panel that will combat wokeness in the military and look at how to turn around its recruiting crisis, he said in an exclusive interview with Breitbart News on Thursday.

The panel, hosted by the Heritage Foundation, will take a deep look at how to refocus the military on winning wars versus initiatives aimed at diversity, equity, and inclusion — many of which were begun under the Obama administration and have been redoubled under the Biden administration.

Waltz, an Army National Guard colonel slated to become the chairman of the House Armed Services Readiness Subcommittee, spoke to Breitbart News. “This is about a warrior culture that we need to maintain — one that is focused on winning our nation’s wars. And I think the big theme that you’ll hear from me and from this panel is it’s about standards — not gender or race, or socioeconomic background,” he said.

“It’s about what the nation needs to fight and win our wars and to deter our adversaries from even entering any type of conflict in the first place, and from military academies to basic training, to all the way through the military culture. That’s what we need to get back to, and what we need to be focused on.”

Some of the Biden Pentagon’s first initiatives were to reverse the Trump Pentagon’s transgender policy and to implement a force-wide effort to identify and root out “extremists.”

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin hired the department’s first senior adviser on Human Capital and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, and convened the Counter-Extremism Working Group. He also mandated that all service members be fully vaccinated or face discharge.

Waltz said the panel will look at the impact of woke initiatives on military readiness and recruitment.

“It’s collecting the data on, for example, why [potential] recruits may make initial contact but then not ultimately join…also what is the impact on minority communities when you have the Secretary of Defense declaring that the military’s overrun with white supremacy?” he said.

“You have these narratives of how bad the military is, overlaid with how bad our country is — why is that a country you would want to go put your life on the line [for]?”

“It’s all interlinked. If you have terrible equipment and terrible training, you’re going to lose people that are going to get out. If you have to throw all your money to recruit people in the first place, you don’t have [it] to spend on equipment and training. So we need to get into a positive cycle right now. We’re in the negative cycle,” he said.

The panel will also look at the impact of the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate on readiness and recruitment.

Waltz said the panel will work with an eye towards changing Pentagon policy in the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act..

During the panel’s first meeting this week, he told members:

I really hope we can provide some serious recommendations for the FY ’24 National Defense Authorization Act…to really, truly take some some bold steps strengthening our military readiness and addressing the polarization that we’re seeing in our military that I believe is negatively affecting recruiting and retention.

The panel has seven other members who are distinguished military experts, service members, and former officials, including:

• Michael Berry, vice president of external affairs, director of military affairs and senior counsel for First Liberty Institute. He joined First Liberty in 2013 after serving for seven years on active duty as an attorney with the U.S. Marine Corps.
• Lt. Gen. Robert D. “Rod” Bishop Jr., retired U.S. Air Force, chairman of the board at STARRS (Stand Together Against Racism and Radicalism in the Services)
• Rebeccah Heinrichs, a senior fellow at Hudson Institute, specializing in U.S. national defense policy with a focus on strategic deterrence. Heinrichs served in the U.S. House of Representatives as an adviser to former Rep. Trent Franks.
• Jeremy Hunt, a media fellow at Hudson Institute. He graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and was later deployed to Afghanistan. Hunt was a recent candidate for the U.S. Congress.
• Earl Matthews, an American government official and attorney who has held senior positions within the Department of the Army and at the White House. Matthews has been an Army Reserve officer for 23 years, including three years deployed to combat zones, and is still serving as a colonel in the Army Reserve.
• Retired Army Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, the 25th national security adviser and senior fellow at the Hoover Institution
• Morgan Ortagus, founder of Polaris National Security, a venture capital investor and former spokesperson for the U.S. Department of State from 2019 to 2021. She is also an intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve.

Retired Army Lt. Gen. Thomas Spoehr, director of The Heritage Foundation’s Center for National Defense, will serve as the panel’s executive secretary. He said in a statement:

We had an exceptionally productive meeting today focused on defining the key issues and a timeline for delivering a meaningful report that provides recommendations for our military. Each member was vocal in their desire to use this opportunity to help the military increase its readiness and address the challenges we have seen with military readiness. We have a four-month sprint ahead of us, but we fully intend to produce a report with recommendations by the end of March.

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