The following is an email I sent to local news reporters asking for information after calling other news tip lines. All expressed interest but had reporters already assigned elsewhere. They asked me to send them an email with my concerns and said they’d follow up. So we’ll see... 🤷
Thank you for requesting information about sitting vigil outside Mike Levin's Congressional District Office in Dana Point, CA. As a 40-year-old totally and permanently disabled combat veteran, my body doesn't have the same strength a 42 year old Rosa Parks had when she stood up for human dignity on this day 57 years ago. Some of us only get to aspire to sainthood...
I anticipated staying into the night and sleeping on the ground like I was used to in the army, but I have to be honest about what my body and my family can take in the face of Mike Levin's disrespect and disregard of the rights of military families. I will continue to vigil until the end of business at 5pm and I hope that Make Levin's staff (CCed) will show up and make good on the promises their boss has refused to honor. I have been documenting my action on TikTok; https://www.tiktok.com/@iamloganmi
Levin's staff has insisted I be on a Zoom Call tomorrow morning at 9am, a meeting I was given 25 hours advance warning of and which conflicts with drop off for my two children. Here is the call-in info. I hope you will join us, perhaps you might see something in the information below that stirs questions you think your readers might be interested in;
[redacted]
Finally, here is the email that constitutes what I hoped to share with his staff ...until they tucked tail and ran.
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Mike Levin was sworn into office Jan. 3, 2019 and was assigned to the House Committee on Veterans Affairs, and awarded the Chairmanship of the Economic Opportunity Subcommittee, which he has held his entire four-year tenure as a Congressman. Though not a veteran, he is supposed to represent San Clemente (with an above-average veteran concentration of 9.5%), Oceanside (10.9% vets), and Camp Pendleton (over 40k servicemembers). According to their website, his Subcommittee “has legislative, oversight, and investigative jurisdiction over the education of veterans, employment and training of veterans…” At the time he took office, that jurisdiction included 38 USC 4212, which created affirmative action for certain veterans in 1974. As part of the law, veterans alleging employment discrimination can file complaints with the Secretary of Labor, who must report to Congress. Here is the relevant subsection, in red;
The reports required by 4212(c) are administered and transmitted to Congress by a DoL subagency known as VETS; Veterans Education and Training Service. Here are the statements of compliance in the last three Fiscal Year Reports;
These statements are frequently not true. 4212(c) requires DOL to report "the number of reports... the actions taken thereon and resolutions thereof." This is the FY2019 report, which Levin's office would have received;
This DOL VETS report to Congress includes "the number of complaints" but is missing "the actions taken thereon and resolutions thereof." As chairman of the Economic Opportunity Subcommittee, I brought this to Mike Levin's attention on May 14, 2019. Then, On July 26, 2019 I asked Mike Levin live on C-SPAN
Would you be willing and able to hold a hearing in your committee, Economic Opportunity Subcommittee under [the House Veterans Affairs Committee] to look into how to consolidate and expand and strengthen those civil rights that do exist for soldiers and veterans?
He responded favorably. Below you can view the clip, or click HERE. I never got a reply to follow-up emails and in January his party will hand over control of House committees to Republicans.
The FY2020 VETS reports did become minimally compliant with 38 USC 4212(c), in part, I suspect, because of pressure I applied to agents William Torrans and Robert Shepard. Here is the FY2020 VETS report (note the table at the bottom with the relevant data);
In June of 2022, my family returned to our native Orange County. When the FY2021 VETS report was published, I discovered that not only had it removed the 4212(c) table, it had removed all mention of complaints, a violation of 4212(c);
A few days after the report went live on the VETS website, I visited Levin's office in Dana Point, where I spoke with a staffer and set an in-person meeting with him for December 1st, the 57th anniversary of Rosa Park's civil disobedience that sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the modern civil rights movement as we know it.
I also asked for an in-person meeting with Mike Levin himself, since his office had failed to act on the information despite the responsibility being chairperson requires. When my wife and I arrived this morning a few minutes late, I saw the same Dana Point staff member who had set the meeting up in his car. He would later drive away in the same car.
I do not know what Levin and his staff are afraid of, but I have a few guesses, and it has to do with the story the data tells. Stories of unchecked harassment, bias, and discrimination against veterans like myself. In 2016, I filed a 4212 complaint against Duke University. I won't go into all the details, but here is the form I submitted in September 2016;
A year later, my complaint was denied for "insufficient evidence" despite rampant corruption, including flagrant disregard for the law by university officials. In just one instance, a document was altered despite being under active investigation, a violation of 18 USC §1505 and 18 USC §1519. Here is a university policy they didn't even try to hide being altered two four days before Veterans Day and two months into a 12+ month investigation;
When I FOIAed the enforcement data from DOL, I discovered what the DOL and/or Levin might be afraid to become public knowledge; employment discrimination against veterans is a BIG problem. Since 2004, veterans complaints under 4212 represents DOL's largest caseload. But in that same period of time they dened veterans their rights as much as four times as they did complaints under other statutes. Here is the FOIA data visualized;
Levin has some explaining to do to the veteran community. I suppose that might make him afraid of his own constituents. But that is no excuse for what he has done today by running from, gaslighting, and canceling meetings with his own military constituents. He needs to answer for what he has failed to do while he controlled the only Congressional body responsible for veteran employment and holding agencies like VETS accountable for false reports.
