[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 15] [Senate] [Page 23032] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL REPEAL ACT Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I was regrettably absent for the vote on the cloture motion to H.R. 2965, The Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act as my wife and I had a long standing family commitment to attend my grandson's graduation. If I had been present, I would have voted against cloture. I have long stated that our troops should not be held hostage to controversial social policy changes at a time when our Nation is at war. Several top military leaders have concluded that changing military policy could jeopardize our soldiers fighting for our Nation. That is something I cannot support. These concerns were only reaffirmed a few days ago when the Commandant of the Marine Corps, GEN James Amos was quoted as saying, ``I take that very, very seriously . . . I don't want to lose any marines to the distraction [of implementing the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell] . . . I don't want any marines that I'm visiting at Bethesda [National Naval Medical Center military hospital in Maryland] with no legs be the result of any type of distraction.'' This opinion was echoed by Air Force Chief of Staff Norton Schwartz, who stated in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee that he opposed implementing any reform until 2012 because he did ``not agree with the study assessment that the short-term risk to military effectiveness is low.'' Moreover, the recent report also showed that the percentage of those servicemembers in combat arms units which predicted a negative or very negative effects on their unit's ability to ``work together to get the job done'' stood at an alarming 48 percent within Army combat arms units, and 58 percent within Marine combat arms units. Our military leaders and front-line forces have spoken. They do not believe repealing don't ask, don't tell is appropriate at this crucial time in our Nation's history and neither do I. ____________________