MILITARY FAMILIES CALL ON SENATE TO REJECT WAR FUNDING

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE -- 5/19/2009

Contact: Military Families Speak Out -- 617-983-0710, press@mfso.org

MILITARY FAMILIES CALL ON SENATE TO REJECT WAR FUNDING

Nationwide -- Military Families Speak Out, the nation’s largest organization of military families opposing the continuing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, is calling on the U.S. Senate to reject a $91.3 billion “Emergency Supplemental” bill that includes $75.8 billion in new funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed a similar bill last Thursday.

Lisa Leitz, a member of Military Families Speak Out from Hanford, CA says

"My husband is a fighter pilot who will deploy with the USS Nimitz in July and fly over both Iraq and Afghanistan. Just this week U.S. fighter planes dropped bombs that killed scores of Afghan civilians. Every time this happens I wonder, next time will my husband be one of those pilots who pulls the trigger and takes innocent lives? How will he live with himself if he is? The grief and rage caused by the rising civilian deaths drives many to turn against U.S. service members. Well into the sixth and seventh years of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the presence of the U.S. military continues to fuel violence in those countries and their allies.

“We need to bring our troops home, and to do that, the Senate must reject this war supplemental funding bill. These countries need diplomatic and humanitarian aid, not more U.S. soldiers and bombs."

Military Families Speak Out member Anna Berlinrut of South Orange, NJ is the mother of a Marine Reservist who just returned from his third deployment to Iraq. She says:

“Before the election of 2006, our Democratic leaders in Congress told the American people that they could not stop the war in Iraq because they were in the minority.  The Bush administration’s war policies were overwhelmingly rejected by the American people in the 2008 election.  President Obama and our generals on the ground have said that there is no military solution in Afghanistan.  Yet the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan go on.  We will not find peace in Afghanistan by escalating troop levels, nor will the war in Iraq end with 50,000 American troops remaining in country. Congress cannot end these wars by continuing to fund them.”

Members of Military Families Speak Out and Gold Star Families Speak Out are available for interview .

Military Families Speak Out is a national organization of military families working to bring all U.S. troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan and secure the care that our troops, Veterans, and military families need to recover from the impact of those wars on their lives. Gold Star Families Speak Out is a national chapter of Military Families Speak Out whose members’ loved ones have died as a result of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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