Austin going AWOL does Biden no favors
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is entitled to privacy about his medical matters.
He was not, however, entitled to conceal from President Biden that he would be undergoing an “elective medical procedure” in December that landed him in intensive care on Jan. 2 — all before he or anyone else bothered to tell the president about any of it.
If Austin wanted secrecy about his surgery and hospital stay, his own choices have rendered that impossible. His unforced error has created a mess for Biden and a welcome gift to Republicans eager for any opportunity to undercut the president’s bid for reelection.
On Tuesday, Austin’s doctors at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center revealed that Austin’s surgery was for the treatment of prostate cancer that had been diagnosed in early December.
Unlike the GOP’s bogus impeachment inquiry targeting Biden, their threats to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and the constant hounding of Hunter Biden for no reason other than his surname, this is a scandal that can’t be chalked up to mendacious Republican accusations.
On Dec. 22, Austin had elective surgery at Walter Reed in Maryland and was released the next day. He suffered “severe pain” on Jan. 1 from post-surgery complications and was placed in the hospital’s intensive care unit. A day later, General Charles Q. Brown Jr., chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was told of Austin’s hospitalization, and Kathleen Hicks, deputy defense secretary, assumed some of her boss’s duties the next day.
On Jan. 4, Hicks — and Biden — were finally told about Austin’s condition and hospitalization, which were made public by the Pentagon on Jan. 5.
Kelly Magsamen, Austin’s chief of staff, has ordered a 30-day review of the Pentagon’s “process and procedures” for notifying the White House and senior national security members if the secretary needs to transfer duties to a deputy. White House officials said Biden continues to have full confidence in Austin.
But some Republicans are already demanding that the defense secretary resign or be fired. Democrats aren’t going that far, but neither are they rushing to Austin’s defense.
During a CNN interview on Monday, Democratic Representative Gerry Connolly of Virginia, a member of the House Foreign Affairs committee, said Austin has “got some explaining to do.” He added that “given what’s going on in the world, the secretary of defense cannot go missing and cannot go missing unexplained.”
Austin remains hospitalized but out of intensive care. And the only explanation he has offered so far came in a brief written statement Saturday. He said he understands “the media concerns about transparency and I recognize I could have done a better job ensuring the public was appropriately informed. I commit to doing better. But this is important to say: this was my medical procedure, and I take full responsibility for my decisions about disclosure.”
It’s difficult to imagine that Austin, who served 41 years in the US Army and led troops in Iraq and Afghanistan before retiring as a four-star general, would have tolerated any of his soldiers going AWOL. But that’s essentially what Austin did.
Prostate cancer is the most common form of cancer in American men, especially Black African-American men. That some procedures are deemed so embarrassing or subject to judgment that patients resist talking about them may speak to our own immaturity about body functions and dysfunctions.
But the reason behind Austin’s surgery doesn’t justify his decision that his absence was no one’s business but his own. Now Republicans are jutting their chins into any available TV camera and pretending that they care about truth and transparency. They certainly weren’t concerned about such things when former president Donald Trump slipped off to Walter Reed for an undisclosed visit in 2019 for what was reported years later as a colonoscopy.
But the GOP has seized on the Austin story as evidence that Biden is clueless about what’s happening in his administration and is unfit to be president. And because Austin is this nation’s first Black defense secretary, they’re also turning up the racist refrain that he was never the right person for the job.
House Republican Representative Jim Banks of Indiana said Austin has “been a disaster since Day One and should be replaced by someone who will focus on making the military ready to fight and win wars instead of advancing woke political causes of the Biden admin.”
Given very recent events, don’t think conservatives in Congress and the media aren’t feeling emboldened in their ability to force people they don’t like, especially those who are historic firsts, out of high-ranking positions.
With two raging foreign wars in which this nation is deeply involved, Austin’s actions were unconscionable. This shouldn’t cost him his job, but he must answer fully and without reservation for his decision. Yes, much of the Republican chest-thumping is selfserving, Trump-pleasing guff. But there’s no downplaying the fact that Austin has created an unwanted and noisy distraction for Biden at a time when the president — and a reelection campaign still grasping to find its rhythm — can ill-afford it.