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By: Anne Marshall-ChalmersThis story was originally published by The War Horse, a nonprofit newsroom educating the public on the military.Photo illustration by Hrisanthi PickettSubscribe nowOn weekends, Staff Sgt. Todd VanCantfort, an armed forces police officer in San Antonio, Texas, targeted gay bars in search of anyone in the military. One time, at the direction of his supervisor, he ditched his light blue and navy uniform to dress gay. He chose tight jeans, cowboy boots, and an open button-down shirt, advertising a burst of chest hair.It was 1985. San Antonio was dotted with several military installations and even more bars, many of them rowdy dance clubs where VanCantfort would break up fights or drive slurring servicemembers back to base.At the gay clubs, though, his orders were clearround up anyone in the military and turn them in, so leadership could kick them out.Victimizing the people for no reason, is how VanCantfort now describes it.Todd VanCantfort was a member of the San Antonio Armed Forces Police Department in the mid-80s. (Photo courtesy of Todd VanCantfort)Forty years later, those witch hunts sound archaic. But they cast a long shadow over a military still struggling to make amendsand now serve as a reminder of a disturbing legacy as Donald Trump returns to the White House next year. His now-embattled choice to lead the defense department, Fox News host and former National Guard soldier Pete Hegseth, has declared a war on woke.Hes railed against women in combat, transgender rights, and diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts that he insists have demoralized troops and weakened our fighting forces. Whether the controversial Hegseth is confirmed or not, his nomination has rekindled the question of who is welcome to serve in the United States military. And Trumps ties to the authors of Project 2025, a conservative and controversial blueprint for his second term, adds to the uncertainty.For those caught up in the witch hunts that rooted out LGBTQ service members, the disgrace is everlasting.I dont know how to explain to somebody what it feels like when your own military that you volunteered to fight for your country doesnt want you, says Elaine Rodriguez, who was outed as a lesbian and kicked out of the Navy in 1991. She still mourns the military career taken from her and the self-worth that never fully rebounded.Elaine Rodriguezpictured with her mother, Maria,was 23 when she left their Florida home for Navy boot camp. (Photo courtesy of Elaine Rodriguez)Stories like Rodriguezs have recently inspired pardons and other actions by the White House and the Defense Department. But, as The War Horse has reported, those efforts have benefitted only a fraction of the tens of thousands of gay and lesbian veterans who were kicked out. Still, advocates hoped that the small gains made under President Biden would lead to more sweeping action. That now seems unlikely.Its not exactly deja vu, said Rodriguez, now 58 and living in Jacksonville, Florida, but it is scary that once again people who want to serve may be forbidden from doing so, much like in the 1980s.She and VanCantfort are sharing their stories with The War Horsefrom opposite sides of the witch huntsto shed light on a painful and calculating discriminatory past that they say must not be forgotten.Uncloseted Media is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.How The Raids Went DownVanCantfort, now retired and living outside Washington, D.C., was among a cadre of police officers, criminal investigators, commanders, and JAGs across the globe who executed the militarys anti-gay policies that stretched from the 1950s through the repeal of dont ask, dont tell in 2011 and resulted in the dismissal of about 100,000 servicemembers.In those days, when the staff sergeant pulled up to a gay club, it often would unfold like this:Intimidate the crowd just by walking in, ask for the military IDs of people they recognized or suspected were in the military, and haul those folks back to their base, outing them to their commander. License plates with military decals in the parking lot were jotted down and reported.On occasion, though, things went sideways. One night, he remembers arriving with two or three other officers at a smoke-filled country western lesbian bar on the outskirts of San Antonio. When they entered, the twangy band stopped playing. The lights popped on.Someonethe bar ownerbarked into the mic, telling her patrons to protect their friends in uniform.The women stood shoulder to shoulder, forming a wall, allowing any scared service member to flee through a back exit. Because most of the women in the bar were civilians, they knew the armed forces police wouldnt arrest them. They inched so close to VanCantfort, he could feel their anger and their message was clearget the fuck out; leave us alone.Making Her Family ProudIn December 1989, Elaine Rodriguez joined the Navy, following in the footsteps of her Navy veteran father and her older brother, a Marine.Elaine Rodriguez appears serious and focused in her official boot camp photo. (Photo courtesy of Elaine Rodriguez)She was 23 when she left her hometown of Jacksonville, Florida, to begin boot camp in Orlando, Florida.In her official boot camp photo, she appears so serious that she almost scowls. The militarys strict rules, she says, were a shock to the system. But she enduredIm not a quitteronly landing in trouble once for giggling with a friend during physical training.When boot camp graduation day finally arrived, her family came to Orlando to celebrate. Rodriguezs father beamed in the family photos. It was the proudest Rodriguez had ever seen him. From Orlando, Rodriguez went to Naval Station Great Lakes in Illinois to train as an electricians mate.Having grown up in a protective, Catholic, Puerto Rican family, Rodriguez was on her own in the Navy for the first time and loved the independence. I was doing my own thing, she says. I was happy. I guess I could compare it to going to college but getting paid.The Rodriguez family celebrated with Elaine during her boot camp graduation in Orlando. Left photo, Elaine, center, with her dad, Pablo, and older brother, Paul. It was the proudest shed ever seen her father, she said. Right photo, from left to right, her younger brother, Philip, their mother, Maria, and her older brother, Paul. (Photos courtesy of Elaine Rodriguez)She made friends easily. She studied when she had to and stayed out late at bars when she wanted. Before the military, she had imagined that at some point, shed find a husband and have kids.In Great Lakes, away from her home state of Florida, unexpected feelings found the space to emerge. Am I gay? shed wonder.Origins of the Militarys Witch HuntsWhen VanCantfort gets going on his military career, hes a fast talker, and on a humid September day in Washington, D.C., hes a conveyor belt of memories. He starts in the early 80s when he was a military dog handler (13 dogs, many bites) and winds up in Germany and then Greece during the first Gulf War when hes helping secure military facilities and receiving slaps on the wrist for his hard-charging, eff-the-bureaucracy-and-get-it-done attitude.Staff Sgt. Todd VanCantfort sometime in the late 80s. (Photo courtesy of Todd VanCantfort)His tales, however, lose color and momentum when the era of anti-gay stuff in San Antonio surfaces. His manner becomes careful, even procedural. The 80s were the era of the new AIDS epidemic and a conservative, Reagan-era Defense Department. In 1981, Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger made discharge mandatory for gay service members, solidifying a practice that had already been established but was inconsistent among the branches.The militarys anti-gay policy dates back to World War Is Articles of War, which implemented a ban that prohibited gay sex. And in 1951, the Uniform Code of Military Justice outlawed sodomy with Article 125a ban on oral and anal sexwhich resulted in gay and lesbian service members being pushed out and occasionally prosecuted. Its unclear how many gay service members were court-martialed, and in September, The War Horse filed a lawsuit to compel the branches to turn over those records.In the years after World War II, the military sought to expel some of the hundreds of thousands of women who had enlisted as part of The Womens Army Corps or WAC (originally the Womens Army Auxiliary Corps or WAAC) and the term witch hunt emerged.Wartime posters promoted the role of women in the Army Auxiliary Corps (Courtesy of U.S. Army)Details of a few of those witch hunts are spelled out in formerly classified documents from 1950-1951 that The War Horse learned had been anonymously surrendered to a museum in Hawaii.In a December 1950 memo, for instance, a military investigator focuses on an insidious female ring that military leaders believed was introducing homosexuality to new WAC trainees at Fort Lee, Virginia. The homosexual road is not only down, it is always a continuous road from the first homosexual act to the end of the roadthe brutal sex crime, a different investigator later wrote.A modus operandi document described how investigators compiled allegations and rumors, secured and maintained an informant system, inspected mail, and interrogated and polygraph-tested women in the ranks.Women soldiers admitted under interrogation to letting loose just like their male counterpartsdrunken nights, parties. A few reported suspicions of certain women being that way. Others reported that they had witnessed women petting or kissing or involved in a lovers quarrel.Nobody got off easy. In a document that included notes from a meeting between an Army colonel and a general, a colonel wrote: The Army would build a case against the guilty that will STICK.Once classified documents spell out the examples of witch hunts in the early 1950s with the Armys Womens Auxiliary Corps. (Courtesy of Honokaa Heritage Center)Sticky Note Waiting on Her DoorWithin a year of enlisting, Rodriguez was on track to become an electricians mate. One afternoon, right before Labor Day weekend in 1990, she was heading to a night class when a lieutenant commander came into a common area of the barracks with an order: If the women knew of any homosexual activity, they better report it.This visit came a few years after a notorious witch hunt involving Marines at Parris Island. Almost half of the 246 women in a unit were questioned. Sixty-five of them subsequently were pushed out of the Marines.Elaine Rodriguez studies in the barracks at Naval Station Great Lakes. (Photo courtesy of Elaine Rodriguez)But Rodriguez wasnt too worried. She wasnt going to narc on anyone. A few weeks passed and she assumed the whole thing would blow over.However, one night, when she returned from a class, she was told she had to go to the Navys on-base legal department. A stern superior in uniform was waiting for her. He grilled her about alleged homosexual activity that he had heard about.He said, This isnt a witch hunt, Rodriguez recalls. And in my mind, I said, Well, I didnt say it was. So it must be. It was the first time she had ever even heard that phrase.Rodriguez denied going out to gay bars and being attracted to women, and he let her go. She put the ordeal behind her and looked forward to shipping out to her first duty station in Hawaii.A few weeks later, though, a sticky note on her door told her to go to the Naval Investigative Service. She headed to the NIS building. The walk was short, but dread warped time into a long and withering few minutes.When she got there, two Naval investigators knew everything. Her girlfriend? A civilian named Marty. Her favorite gay bar? Rivers Edge. Overwhelmed and crying, Rodriguez confessed.I was in shock. The only thing that had ever happened to me prior to this was a speeding ticket, she says. I literally felt like a criminal.The Navy kicked her out with an other than honorable dischargea common practice that not only marred the records of thousands of service members but denied them access to veterans benefits such as health care and the G.I. Bill. Rodriguezs commander wrote in her exit paperwork that her behavior is not compatible with the lifestyle of a service member and will not be tolerated. The governing body that determines whether a servicemember deserves being kicked out, decided she had committed a serious offense. And with that, the Navy emptied out her plan for the future.Silence Proves the Safest BetRodriguez isnt sure how investigators gathered intimate details about her. This was before cell phones and social media. She suspects either someone in her unit ratted her out or someone spotted her at Rivers Edge, the gay club outside Chicago.VanCantfort knows that both scenarios are probable. In the early 1980s, in San Antonio, the Armed Forces disciplinary control board would create the list of bars he and his fellow officers had to scope out on weekends.He also remembers times when service members who were in trouble would offer intel (with or without evidence) on gays and lesbians in uniform in exchange for a lighter punishment.It creates a whole class of people that are victimized with no way to get help, he says, because the system is so secured against them.Its why gay people in the military lived quiet, closeted lives, the sword of Damocles hanging above them should they share the truth even with close friends. In a system built entirely on power imbalance, silence proved the safest bet.VanCantfort said he learned all of this a few months into his enlistment at 19 years old.One night after a barracks party, with a few beers in him, he crawled into bed. At some point, he stirred awake and found someone standing in the dark beside his bed. The man, who VanCantfort recognized as living in the barracks, was naked.Shocked, VanCantfort recalls stammeringHow did you get in my room? Get the fuck out.He had honed scrappy fighting skills as a kid growing up poor in Texas and Massachusetts. He attended a dozen schools and didnt flinch at throwing a punch or insult to defend himself.As the man moved toward the bed, VanCantfort said he fought him off. For weeks, though, the man taunted VanCantfort, daring him to report the attempted assault. Making sure I understood, he would flip the story and claim I was a fag and was trying to hit on him, VanCantfort recalls. So he stayed quiet.A couple of years later, as an armed forces police officer engaging in witch hunts, VanCantfort stepped into a role that gave him all the power.Little Changes Under Dont Ask, Dont TellAfter Rodriguez learned in late 1990 that she was getting kicked out with an other than honorable discharge, the news spread around Great Lakes. Stares and slurs followed her for the 45 days it took to process her discharge. Sailors taunted her with catcalls. Take her out back, theyd say. She was assigned to clean the barracks.One day, a female sailor in the barracks called outRodriguez!and demanded that she repair something in her room. Rodriguez walked in, and the woman shut the door and sexually assaulted her.Rodriguez never told anyone. Who would believe her?Homophobia was rampant in the early 90s and continued into the dont ask, dont tell era, which ended in 2011. President Obama repealed the policy, which was intended as a compromise to an outright ban on gays in uniform, allowing them to serve as long as they kept it hidden. Witch hunts slowed, but did not disappear.Flanked by members of Congress and then-Vice President Joe Biden, President Obama signs the act repealing dont ask, dont tell. (Photo by Chuck Kennedy of the White House)Since then, the Pentagon has invited gay and lesbian service members who were discriminated against to apply for a discharge upgrade, an often cumbersome process that only about 1,700 service members have pursued, according to the Defense Department. Most have received an upgrade.In October, the Pentagon announced that it had identified 820 veterans who were kicked out of the military because of their sexual orientation under dont ask, dont tell, and that those veterans would now receive honorable discharges.And over the summer, President Biden announced pardons for gay and lesbian veterans who were convicted in a military court for consensual sex. But as The War Horse has reported, the narrow confines of the pardon exclude thousands of gay and lesbian veterans who were forced out of the military but didnt wind up in court. As of November, only 14 veterans had applied.Dixon Osburn, an attorney who helped orchestrate the repeal of dont ask, dont tell in 2011 supports all this federal action, but says gay service members who were kicked out in the 90s and earlier, like Rodriguez, often dont have records that clearly indicate the true nature of their dismissal from the military.This leaves the Department of Defense with a tricky choice. Are you just going to carte blanche, get rid of all the derogatory records, because the system is so flawed? Osburn says. That might be the easiest thing to do, but the military, I think, is trying to be exacting and making sure that they dont overturn appropriately recorded bad conduct.Osburn and other advocates dont know what to expect from President-elect Trump when it comes to reparations for veterans kicked out of the military because of their sexual orientation.Hegseth provided some clues during an interview that aired just two days after the election on The Shawn Ryan Show, a podcast hosted by a former Navy SEAL and CIA contractor. The dumbest phrase on planet Earth in the military is our diversity is our strength, Hegseth said, pumping his book The War on Warriors.He lamented the militarys slide into wokeness, beginning, he said, under President Clinton with the tinkering of dont ask, dont tell and really accelerating, he said, under President Obama. He talked about frequent conversations with veterans and active-duty service members complaining that standards are dropping, the woke stuff is everywhere, and telling him, I feel like Im walking on eggshells.About a week later, Trump announced he was tapping Hegseth to lead the military. But as controversy swirled around Hegseths character, reports surfaced Wednesday that Trump is considering another veteran with a well-established track record of policies decried by the LGBTQ communities: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.Didnt Want to Be GayAccording to Department of Defense statistics, a majority of gay and lesbian servicemembers who were kicked out before 2011 were quietly discharged with an honorable or general discharge.Rodriguez wasnt as lucky.After the Navy booted her with an other than honorable discharge, she returned home to Jacksonville and lied to her family, telling them a fistfight led to her dismissal. I didnt want to be gay, she says. I started dating a guy. I would hide my paperwork, my DD 214, and everything, I would hide it under my mattress.She tried to become a detective. But a police academy wouldnt accept her because of the commission of a serious offense on her record. She eventually got work at a medical supply company, which shes grateful for, but its not the career she wanted. She also, eventually, confessed to her family that she was gay, and thats the reason the Navy disposed of her.For three decades she largely kept her past military service to herself, ashamed of her short time in uniform and her unceremonious exit. About 21 years ago, though, at the urging of her family, she decided shed try to get her discharge upgraded. Military review boards denied her upgrade application three times for various reasons, including her admission of lying all those years ago. But with the help of a lawyer, earlier this year Rodriguez finally received an honorable discharge.Its bittersweet, she says.Her parents have died, and she cant share her victory with them. Rodriguez turned 58 in November. Her childhood dream of becoming a cop after religiously watching the tough New York female officers on Cagney and Lacey is long gone.In the last two years, her fight to get that honorable discharge has revived old memories she thought she had wiped away, like the sexual assault. In the last year, she has had trouble falling asleep. She started relying on alcohol to doze off and is now on medication to cut that craving.In the middle of the night, her wife will occasionally find her in the fetal position with blankets over her head.I dont like to say they screwed up my life, Rodriguez says, referring to the Navy. But they screwed up my life.Whats Next After Trumps Victory?Rodriguez and VanCantfort have never met. But when The War Horse told her about the former military police officer who participated in witch hunts, she was taken aback. Why would he do it? She wondered.I just cant even imagine having that type of job, Rodriguez said. I actually feel bad for him.At the time, VanCantfort was young and following orders. Even back then, he said, he disagreed, but disobeying was not an option.Thats insubordination, he says. And thats grounds for getting kicked out of AFPD [Armed Forces Police Department] as well as not getting any other good assignments.After a year with the San Antonio Armed Forces Police, VanCantfort left the witch hunts behind for a new assignment. He ascended in the military, eventually retiring as a master sergeant. His license plate reads USAF 23, honoring the 23 years he spent in the Air Force. And outside of the military, he compiled nearly two decades as a cop and intelligence expert.After retiring from the Department of Homeland Security in 2018, VanCantfort now volunteers his time with organizations to build safe neighborhoods and investigate cold cases. (Photo courtesy of Todd VanCantfort)VanCantfort, 61, is not a big feelings guy and speaks matter-of-factly. When asked how he believes a Trump presidency will impact a woke, more inclusive service, he offers a belief he repeats often: Anyone who is mentally and physically fit to commit themselves to their country should have the chance. And the military should stick to being nonpartisan.The Trump transition team did not respond to questions about whether the new administration plans to keep Bidens pardons for convicted gay veterans intact, or eliminate policies it considers woke. It also failed to respond on whether the Trump White House will reinstate a ban on trans servicemembers enlisting. According to a recent Newsweek article no decision has been made on a potential trans ban.On the day after Trumps victory, Rodriguez decided to display her honorable discharge for the first time on Facebook. In the post, she congratulated Trump voters while thanking Presidents Biden and Obama for trying to right the wrongs of the past. If it werent for them, I would not be getting what I deserve as well as many others, she wrote.Elaine Rodriguez shared her Honorable Discharge on Facebook the day after the election. (Facebook)Some of her Trump-voting friends liked the post, and perhaps that shouldve heartened her that the chorus of anti-woke talk will soften now that the election is over.She cant help but worry, though, for one of her male cousins who is in the Army and married to a man. And when her wife wants to hold her hand or kiss in public, she still looks around, paranoid, worried that the affection is somehow wrong. Something to be punished.This War Horse investigation was reported by Anne Marshall-Chalmers, edited by Mike Frankel, fact-checked by Jess Rohan, and copy-edited by Mitchell Hansen-Dewar. Hrisanthi Pickett wrote the headlines.If objective, nonpartisan, rigorous, LGBTQ-focused journalism is important to you, please consider making a tax-deductible donation through our fiscal sponsor, Resource Impact, by clicking this button:Donate to Uncloseted Media
