SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
The Pentagon recently asked nearly 10,000 soldiers to repay excessive bonuses they were given for re-enlisting in the California National Guard between 2007 and 2009 amid the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Congress was notified of the problem in 2014, but representatives failed to pass a provision that would allow the Defense Secretary to waive the repayments.
Some representatives claim that the California National Guard failed to convey the scale of the repayments issue or make it a congressional priority. An outraged and bipartisan group of legislators have called for quick action and full forgiveness of the overpayments (estimated to be around $70 million). On Tuesday, Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter and President Obama have promised to resolve the issue, even as officials acknowledge that the issue may extend to other states:
President Obama has told the Defense Department to expedite its review of nearly 10,000 California National Guard soldiers who have been ordered to repay enlistment bonuses improperly given a decade ago, but he is not backing growing calls for Congress to waive the debts, the White House said Tuesday. The comments by White House spokesman Josh Earnest suggest the administration is running into legal and policy roadblocks as it struggles to handle a public relations headache for the Pentagon, the National Guard and members of Congress who were caught off guard by the scope of the problem.
[...] California Guard officials say they informed California lawmakers about the scale of the debts in 2014, telling them in a list of legislative priorities sent to each House office and the House Armed Services Committee that "thousands of soldiers have inadvertently incurred debt, through no fault of their own because of faulty Army recruiting or accounting practices."
(Score: 2) by tfried on Thursday October 27 2016, @04:38PM
Apparently some applied for the bonus knowing that they were not entitled to it, but also knowing that checking was lousy (AFAIU several of those responsible for deliberately lousy checking went to jail for that). Or, quoting from the second article linked:
"However, many of the soldiers who received the bonuses acted on good faith resulting from bad information; some, however, knowingly committed fraud" read the California Military Department statement.
[...]
In 2011 the California National Guard created a Soldier Incentive and Assistance Center (SIAC) to look at the cases of affected Guardsmen "who acted in good faith."
[...]
"The SIAC, instead, offered a path of appeal and has helped about 4,000 soldiers retain about $37 million in bonus money."
So, if I understand all this correctly, the current path of action is already to essentially waive the bonus payments, but only after a case-by-case check.