Senator Says Pentagon ‘Declaring Victory’ as It Distorts Sexual Assault Numbers
ABC News reports:
When the Pentagon released a new report last Friday detailing what one top official described as “meaningful progress” in combatting the military’s sexual assault epidemic, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand was preparing to release a report of her own.
It might as well have been titled, “Not So Fast.”
In a press conference last week, the Pentagon announced a new military-wide survey had estimated the number of sexual assaults dropped from 26,000 incidents of unwanted sexual contact in 2012 to 20,000 in 2014.
Gillibrand, D-NY, said in an interview with ABC News that the Pentagon is distorting the actual numbers of sexual assaults because it doesn’t measure the rates of service members who sexually assault spouses or civilians.
