Exclusive House Republicans plan to summon Army officials to testify at a hearing next week about a training presentation that called pro-life groups terrorists, Fox News Digital reported.
The House Armed Services Committee's Military Personnel Subcommittee is scheduled to hear from Agnes Schaefer, Under Secretary of the Army for Manpower and Reserve Affairs, and Lt. Gen. Patrick Matlock, Vice Chief of Staff of the Army, on Thursday afternoon.
Republicans, led by Armed Services Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Alabama, and subcommittee Chairman Jim Banks, R-Indiana, wrote a letter to Army Secretary Christine Warmuth requesting information about the slide.
The Army recently responded, acknowledging that the slides “inaccurately referred” to pro-life groups such as Right to Life and Operation Rescue, as well as numerous animal rights and environmental groups such as PETA, as “terrorist organizations.”
Lawmakers slam Army brass for creating training slides that suggest pro-life groups may have terrorism ties
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford speaks during a Christmas Eve ceremony at Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan, December 24, 2017. (AP Photo/Rahamat Gul, File)
Schaefer wrote that the training deck, which was used to train 9,100 Army soldiers at Fort Liberty, North Carolina, from 2017 to 2024, is “inconsistent with Army counterterrorism policy and training.”
Schaefer said the slides have not been reviewed by Fort Liberty leadership and are no longer in use. He added that there is “no evidence” that whoever created the slides “intentionally subverted” Army policy or created them to “advance personal views.”
The slides were used in terrorism awareness training for soldiers who man the gates of Fort Liberty, and Schaefer said they have not been shared outside of the facility.
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The Republican letter from July stated: slide They noted that members of pro-life organizations could pose a threat to the security of military installations and that the official livery of such organizations, such as pro-life license plates, could signal terrorism.
Officials at the Fayetteville, North Carolina, garrison said the person who used the slide remains employed at the facility.
Iraqi soldiers stand guard on a road in a village recently liberated from Islamic State militants on the outskirts of Mosul, Iraq. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban, File)
Until this year, U.S. Army soldiers stationed in North Carolina were trained to be suspicious of pro-life groups, viewing them as “terrorists.” (Source: U.S. Army)
“It's completely absurd to claim that this slide 'doesn't promote personal views,' yet there was no discipline taken against employees at Fort Liberty who conducted anti-life training sessions that clearly violate Army policy,” Banks told Fox News Digital.
Rogers said the hearings are being held “to find out why this happened and to ensure this never happens again.”
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In June, the Army revised parts of its policy, with General Warmuth announcing that “active participation in extremist activities may be prohibited even in circumstances that would be constitutionally protected in civilian settings.”
According to the American Legion, service members are now prohibited from liking, sharing or engaging with content that supports extremism.
Fox News Digital's Charles Kreitz contributed to this report.
