Addressing sexual assault

While touring Navy and Marine Corps facilities in his hometown of San Diego, Harker told the press his priorities as Acting Secretary of the Navy include preventing sexual assault and encouraging sailors to seek mental health counseling following a stressful year during the COVID-19 pandemic. To address the issue of sexual assault, Harker said the Navy and Marine Corps will use data collected over the last couple of years to identify which units are at increased risk of sexual assault incidents, mindful that sexual assault is more likely to occur in units in which sexual discrimination and harassment are evident. “If you have a climate where sexual harassment is tolerated, the predators can hide easier,” he said. “If you have a climate where sexual harassment is not tolerated some of the behaviors that a predator might do ... are less tolerated, so it’s easier to go in and find people.”

Sailor mental health

Harker said another priority will be sailor mental health and for that he will need more Navy corpsmen trained in counseling. Harker's focus on mental health followed the Pentagon's August 2021 annual report to Congress, which cited an increase in suicide rates. A Defense Department inspector general report from the same year concluded access to mental health resources in the military is inadequate, with 53% of active duty service members and their families unable to receive needed mental health care.^[8]

To remove the stigma of seeking mental health counseling, Harker recorded a video in which he said he had sought mental health counseling three times in his life: his parents' divorce, his own divorce; recovery effort involving 80 men, women and children who died in a ferry disaster off the coast of Haiti. In the video, Harker tells sailors, “In the course of your service, you may see and experience things most Americans won’t even think about ... don’t shelve those experiences away.”^[9]

To hire more psychiatrists and trained corpsman, Harker requested funds in the current Defense Department budget be reprogramed to invest in mental health to prevent sailor suicide. It was not clear from which DOD budget the money would be reprogrammed, though both the Secretary of Defense and Congress would have to approve any such transfer of funds.^[10]

Harker said every commanding officer and large unit commander he spoke with has had a member of their command commit suicide sometime during their career.^[11]