@dpic73 , since you asked about appeals for senator marcia kelly, the best i can tell is that he has a limited time period to submit a written response to his notification of the retirement grade determination process that is underway. As this is an administrative action it's really up to the convening authority whether or not they want to give him an opportunity to make his case in person. (hint: they don't so he won't) The written response is his opportunity to make his case why he shouldn't have his retired rank/grade reduced. Highly unlikely that a written response is going to move the needle.
As an aside note, in plain english the logic that the admin is using to pursue this is that commissioned officers' retirement pay is not simply a payment for past service, it is also retainer pay as you are subject to the UCMJ and can be recalled even after retirement. So the admin is saying you did a no-no while still on the payroll so that makes the last rank honorably held the one prior to the one you have now, so we'll call you back to active duty, fix that, then retire you at the next lowest rank/grade.
As far as appeals after the written response (assuming that the secwar goes through with busting him), this is where it gets wild from what i can tell,. An appeal would have to go though a board at the service level (the Navy) . But the secwar is the final authority so the board would have to side against the hypothetial secwar decision to bust him and then recommend back to the secwar to reverse his own decision. Good luck with that.
After that waste of time, kelly could then appeal to a federal court. Normally that would be useless, but in this case, given that the "offense" wasn't from when kelly was on active duty and his position as a senator and the political nature of his job, you might get a court to hear him out on "protected speech" grounds. But with that said... retirement pay is not a right. So...
I personally think that kelly should be burnt with a blowtorch. He knew what he was doing and knew that he was actively fermenting mistrust in the chain of command. Very strongly insinuating that the chain of command had issued illegal orders or was highly likely to do so. I don't care who the secdef or potus is, you dont fu king do that.
There was talk a while back about Gen Milley, and... nothing happened. So that tells me that hegseth does get recommendation / findings that might go agains what he or potus might otherwise want and that he does listen to them, so there is that. Maybe to avoid this being a distraction going into midterms, secwar stops with the stongly worded letter and this goes away. Who knows? I'm guessing like everyone else.
Edit: spelling
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