WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) – A longtime U.S. Air Force pilot suspended for refusing to vaccinate on religious grounds was mistreated by the Biden administration and has grounds to seek restoration and back pay, a review board has found.
Just the News reports that Major Brennan Schilperoort, who served for 17 years, had filed a Religious Accommodation Request in December 2023 to forego the mandatory flu vaccine. According to his attorney R. Davis Younts, the Air Force “refused to process” it on the grounds that “it took so long for the military to process the last one, that if he submits another and it takes the same length to process, then he’ll never get” the shot.
Despite the convoluted reasoning essentially penalizing Schilperoort for the inefficiency of the Air Force’s own process, a Board of Inquiry recommended him for separation in January 2024 and placed him on unpaid involuntary excess leave pending final resolution of his case.
Following the change in military leadership accompanying the 2024 election, however, the case was reconsidered and different conclusions were reached.
On August 13, Air Force Inspector General Lt. Gen. Stephen Davis recommended that Schilperoort “petition the Air Force Board for Correction of Military Records (AFBCMR) for redress.” On August 27, Air Force Review Board Agency Director Troy McIntosh determined the pilot “was discriminated against on the basis of religion when his commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Willie W. Lloyd, issued Appellant a Letter of Reprimand, on January 5, for failure to comply with an order to take the influenza vaccine.”
“Lieutenant Colonel Lloyd issued the Letter of Reprimand knowing [Schilperoort] had submitted a religious accommodation request which was not acted upon, and Appellant had expressed sincerely held religious beliefs objecting to the influenza vaccine,” McIntosh wrote. “Appellant was temporarily exempted from the influenza vaccination immunization compliance while his December 27, 2023, religious accommodation request was pending.”
This means that, while the final determination by the AFBCMR is still pending, it should be a simple matter for Schilperoort to receive back pay and have his flight status restored.
“This is going to have a huge impact on a lot of other people in the Air Force” who are “in the same situation,” Younts said. Liberty Counsel warned last month that similar battles are still going on in the U.S. Marine Corps, as well.
Until December 2022, Biden’s Pentagon leaders enforced COVID-19 shot mandates on American service men and women, provoking lawsuits and threatening soldier and pilot shortages in the tens of thousands, which only added to broader problems of force strength, troop morale, and public confidence.
That and other “woke” priorities took a toll. During a Pentagon press briefing in April 2022 on the Army’s budget for Fiscal Year 2023, Under Secretary of the Army Gabe Camarillo announced the Army had “proactively made a decision to temporarily reduce our end strength from 485,000 Soldiers to 476,000 in FY ’22, and 473,000 in FY ’23.” The Military Times reported at the time that this “could leave the service at its smallest size since 1940, when it had just over 269,000 troops.”
In the first month of his second administration, Trump began the reversal of past presidents’ politicization of the military by reinstating soldiers who had been discharged over COVID shots with their former ranks, back pay, and benefits; reestablishing a ban on service members afflicted with gender dysphoria; and ordering the elimination of “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) programs from the military and discharge of service members afflicted with gender confusion. The administration has also banned LGBT “pride” and “Black Lives Matter” (BLM) flags from being flown at U.S. embassies and other State Department facilities and ended observation of all identity-based “cultural awareness” months.
