Biden ups military’s response to gender-based violence after Vanessa Guillén’s slaying in Texas

President Joe Biden is strengthening the military justice system’s response to sexual and gender-based violence, a move the White House said was key after Houston native and Army Spc. Vanessa Guillén’s death in 2020 and the legislative reforms her murder spurred in Congress. An executive order Biden signed Wednesday establishes sexual harassment as a specific offense under the Uniform Code of Military Justice and will allow officials to prosecute the crime directly. Biden said he signed the order to advance the series of historic reforms Congress passed late last year as part of the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act, including key components of the I Am Vanessa Guillén Act, which specifically called for establishing sexual harassment as an offense under the military justice code.

Guillén, whose dismembered remains were found two months after she went missing from Fort Hood in 2020, told her family she was being sexually harassed at work before she disappeared. Her remains were found buried next to the Leon River outside the massive Army base. In a report released after her death, the Army confirmed Guillén was sexually harassed by a supervisor, but not by the soldier accused of killing her. Continued study of the environment at Fort Hood in Central Texas, the nation’s largest military installation, showed a culture of sexual harassment and a lack of action from leadership. “The Guillén family’s leadership and determination in advocating for change underscored the need for military justice reform, including how the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) addresses sexual harassment,” the White House said in a statement Wednesday. In addition to formally adding sexual harassment to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which activists hope will both help punish offenders and prevent other serious crimes from developing, Biden’s executive order also strengthens the military justice system’s response to domestic violence and the unwanted sharing of intimate visual images.