Failure by the U.S. Coast Guard to investigate and prosecute incidents of sexual assault and harassment extend beyond a scandal at the school’s service academy, a systemic problem that continues to harm personnel across all ranks, a U.S. Senate investigation has found.
Interviews by the Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations with more than 80 victims and others found “ongoing failures” by the Coast Guard to address cases of rape, assault and harassment across the service. A report released Wednesday by the panel said the Coast Guard cultivated a culture of “silencing, retaliation, and failed accountability.”
“The voices of these whistleblowers make clear that sexual assault and sexual harassment in the Coast Guard are fleet-wide problems, impacting enlisted members and officers just as pervasively as [Coast Guard Academy] cadets,” wrote Subcommittee Chairman Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., in the report, “A Pervasive Problem: Voices of Coast Guard Sexual Assault and Harassment Survivors.”
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During a Senate field hearing Thursday in New London, Connecticut, five active and former Coast Guard members discussed their experiences as victims of sexual assault or harassment in the service, describing incidents that occurred as recently as 2022.
One witness described being gang-raped on a Coast Guard cutter in 2004. Twenty years later, when he felt emboldened…
