ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, February 10, 1996 TAG: 9602130078
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press WASHINGTON
President Clinton promised Friday to fight in Congress and the courts against a requirement to discharge military personnel who are HIV-positive. But aides said the administration would still enforce the provision.
The requirement, contained in a bill Clinton will sign today, is unconstitutional, offensive and cruel, the president declared Friday.
Clinton ordered the Justice Department not to defend the provision's constitutionality in the courts. And White House officials predicted that if Congress does not repeal it, the Supreme Court will throw it out.
Nonetheless, the administration made clear that if the AIDS language is neither repealed nor found unconstitutional by the courts, the Defense Department will have no choice but to discharge the 1,049 service members testing positive for HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Known HIV-positive service members total 1,049.
White House counsel Jack Quinn said the Pentagon will wait ``until the last possible moment'' before removing anybody from the military. The provision says a service member must be out of uniform within six months of a positive HIV test.
Quinn said Clinton hopes that setting the discharge process in motion will lead to an early court test of its constitutionality.
The discharge requirement is part of a $265 billion 1996 defense authorization bill Congress adopted last month. Clinton plans to sign the bill today to get money to finance the U.S. military.
He has made clear from the start that he finds unacceptable the provision requiring service members with the AIDS virus to be honorably discharged.
``This provision, in the president's judgment, is mean-spirited and serves no purpose other than to punish people who deserve the government's help, not its hatred,'' Quinn said.
Both Secretary of Defense William Perry and Gen. John Shalikashvili, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, oppose the provision. Quinn said they believe discharging service members deemed fit for duty ``would waste the government's investment in the training of these individuals and be disruptive to the military programs in which they play an integral part.''
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