Team — This is not a fundraising email.

Something happened recently in Congress, and I’ve been carrying it around like a weight. I wrote this email late last night because I feel strongly obligated to tell you about the harsh realities we face, especially in the ongoing fight for freedom and equality.

Last month, the House of Representatives voted on the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) , an annual budget for the Department of Defense (DOD).

The NDAA sets funding levels for the DOD and establishes US defense priorities. Following more than 60 years of precedent, the 2024 NDAA was originally bipartisan when it came out of the House Armed Services Committee.

I am tremendously proud of some victories I secured in the House bill. As a former Army officer and West Point cadet, I know how crucial it is to ensure our service members have the resources, training, and equipment they need to defend our lives and our freedom.

And that should be where this story ends…

But that’s not how it went down.

During the final 24 hours of debate on the bill, GOP extremists hijacked the NDAA to rip away reproductive rights from female soldiers.

Far-right Republicans introduced an amendment to prevent the Department of Defense from reimbursing travel expenses for female service members stationed in states where abortion services aren’t legal or may be inaccessible.

In a despicable betrayal to the women who serve and to our national security, the amendment passed, and all but two Republicans supported it.

But I voted no, because there’s no chance in hell I could look fellow patriots in the eye and tell them they deserved anything less than the freedoms they risked their lives for.

Alongside some of the toughest soldiers on this planet, many of them women, I’ve been on the receiving end of bad foreign policy decisions made by Washington politicians — many of whom never served. Those decisions would send us to fight in forever wars. Some never made it back, some lost friends, but we all witnessed atrocities that changed us. Still our mission was clear: protect and defend American freedoms.

We carried out the mission.

So, you can imagine how much it pisses me off that Washington politicians wouldn’t trust female service members to make basic decisions regarding their own bodies.

If you imagined quite a lot, you’re right and I’ll bet it pisses you off too. There’s much to be angry about, but we’ve got to use that passion and resolve to defeat extremism, and as good as it feels to take the rage and place it in a lengthy late-night mega email, the place we will ultimately secure victory is at the ballot box.

Team, protecting abortion access is the fight of our generation, and next year the battlefield for control of the US House will be here in New York. These extremists won’t stop, and they will bring everything they’ve got.

Still, they would do well to remember that before the American experiment existed, the Hudson Valley — this community, our people — prevented invasion and secured freedom. We’ve been the xxxxxx in major battles to protect it ever since, and we will do it again with every chance we get for as long as it takes — because freedom includes a woman’s right to choose.

Yours in service,

Pat Ryan

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Pat Ryan is a former member of the U.S. Army. Use of his military rank, job titles, and photographs in uniform does not imply endorsement by the Department of the Army or the Department of Defense.
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