By Sergio Arellano-Oros
Rep. Mark Cardenas, D-Phoenix (District 19), on behalf of the Arizona Veterans Caucus, called on Gov. Jan Brewer to reinstate Col. Joey Strickland.
Strickland is the former director of the Arizona Department of Veterans’ Services who recently forced to resign because he hired former state representative Terri Proud. Strickland said he did not know that Proud, a single mother of a terminally ill child was on the Governor’s blacklist.
Cardenas and Rep. Sonny Borrelli, R-Lake Havasu (District 5), the co-chairmen of the Arizona Veterans Caucus, signed and delivered a letter to the governor advocating for Strickland’s reinstatement.
“We sent this letter to the governor because we have received an outpouring of support from veterans for Col. Strickland. He has given five years of diligent service to this state and more than 40 years of service to our country,” Cardenas said. “The Department of Veterans’ Services thrived under Col. Strickland’s direction. The department made great strides in addressing issues affecting our veterans, including unemployment and homelessness. For these reasons and because of the overwhelming demand from the veteran community, we are asking the governor to reinstate Col. Strickland.”
The Governor’s chief of staff, Scott Smith reportedly gave Strickland an obscenity-laden tongue-lashing and asked for his resignation, according to the Yellow Sheet. Strickland said that Smith called him and “was really irate. He was screaming obscenities and yelling and talking down to me. Thoroughly unprofessional.”
Strickland said that the thought the accusation that he violated a direct order was more of an excuse and that there must be some other reason for the Governor’s Office’s opposition to hiring Proud or for the decision to oust him, according to the Yellow Sheet.“When they said I violated a direct order, I felt like it was a spin that was being put on,” Strickland told the Yellow Sheet.
In her press release issued on the day she received notice from the Veterans Service interim director that she would not be hired for the position , Proud pleaded the case for Strickland saying that Brewer “overreacted” to an Arizona Daily Star article. “Regardless of the reason, the result devastated the life of Col. Joey Strickland who did not deserve such careless treatment.
The Governor’s office should check facts before drawing conclusions,” Proud said and blamed Strickland’s ouster on the “backlash to this single article.”
Proud says that she was misquoted in the Arizona Daily Star article, in which Proud reportedly said that “menstrual cycles might be too problematic for women to be in combat.” Proud says that the article written by a college student, Bethany Barnes, took her statements out of context. Proud says that it was Barnes who raised the issue of menstruation to Proud. Proud insisted that she told Barnes that she did not want to discuss the matter.
Within hours of receiving the letter rescinding her job offer from Veteran’s Services interim director, Robert Barnes, Proud appeared on the James T. Harris show. Proud told Harris that “none of those words came from my mouth,” referring to the Star article. She told Harris’s audience that she discussed with the reporter the lack of care for women and questioned how the military would accommodate women in combat when the VA was not accommodating them now.