AUSTIN, Texas – Decisions on whether to prosecute members of the U.S. military for sexual assault or sexual harassment would be handled outside the chain of command under a measure members of Congress proposed Wednesday that is named for a Texas soldier who was slain by a fellow soldier.Reps.
Jackie Speier, a Democrat from California, and Markwayne Mullin, a Republican from Oklahoma, said their bill would make sexual harassment a crime within the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
The bipartisan bill, which has at least 73 cosponsors, also would move prosecution decisions of sexual assault and sexual harassment cases out of the chain of command and instead go to a new chief prosecutor at each branch of the armed forces.