San Francisco Chronicle

Biden promotes female generals

- By Eric Schmitt and Helene Cooper Eric Schmitt and Helene Cooper are New York Times writers.

WASHINGTON — President Biden has nominated two female generals to elite, fourstar commands, the Defense Department announced, months after their Pentagon bosses had agreed on their promotions but held them back out of fears that former President Donald Trump would reject the officers because they were women.

The nomination­s of Gen. Jacqueline Van Ovost of the Air Force to head the Transporta­tion Command, which oversees the military’s sprawling global transporta­tion network, and of Lt. Gen. Laura Richardson of the Army to head the Southern Command, which oversees military activities in Latin America, now advance to the Senate, where they are expected to be approved.

The unusual strategy to delay the officers’ promotions was devised last fall by Mark Esper, the defense secretary at the time, and Gen. Mark Milley, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

They both thought the two generals were exceptiona­l officers deserving of the commands. But under Trump, they worried that any candidates other than white men for jobs mostly held by white men might run into resistance once their nomination­s reached the White House.

So the Pentagon officials delayed their recommenda­tions until after the election, betting that if Biden won, then he would be more supportive of the picks than Trump, who had feuded with Esper and Milley and had a history of disparagin­g women. They stuck to the plan even after Trump fired Esper six days after the election.

The strategy paid off Saturday, when the Pentagon announced that Biden had endorsed the generals’ promotions.

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