Pentagon to Give Honorable Discharges to Some Kicked Out Under ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’

More than 800 service members administratively separated from the military under the now-repealed policy will receive discharge upgrades.

The Pentagon announced on Tuesday that more than 800 service members who were kicked out of the military under the now-repealed “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy will receive honorable discharge upgrades.

Pentagon officials said they had completed a review of about 2,000 cases, as Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III ordered last year.

Mr. Austin said in a statement that the military would “continue to honor the service and the sacrifice of all our troops — including the brave Americans who raised their hands to serve but were turned away because of whom they love.”

About 13,500 service members were separated from the military because of their sexual orientation while the policy was in effect from 1994 until 2011. About a third of them were not considered for discharge upgrades because they were separated during their initial military training and had not served long enough to qualify.

Some groups that work with veterans said the Pentagon should review those cases as well.

“We don’t have a ton of clarity about how the Department of Defense went about its process here,” said Renee Burbank of the National Veterans Legal Services Program, which provides legal assistance to veterans on a wide array of issues.

Ms. Burbank, who serves as the group’s director of litigation, said that about 7,000 of the 13,500 people ousted under “don’t ask, don’t tell” had already received honorable discharges.

“Obviously the D.O.D.’s review here was for a narrow period of time and for a narrow category of cases and doesn’t reflect all of the people who were discharged for discriminatory purposes but didn’t have that reflected on the face of their discharge documents,” she added. “And D.O.D. should be trying to rectify those wrongs as well.”

Ms. Burbank said that based on data previously released by the Pentagon, the 2,000 cases reviewed most recently were probably for men and women who had received “general” or “other than honorable” discharges, which are typically awarded as a result of minor misconduct.

People who leave the military without honorable discharges usually suffer some loss of benefits they would have been eligible to receive through the Department of Veterans Affairs, including educational benefits and health care through the V.A.’s nationwide network of hospitals and clinics.

“I think from our perspective we’re glad to see this work is continuing, but for these folks who are prematurely separated, who weren’t allowed to serve enough time, the V.A. should look at those cases and extend benefits to them,” said Tramecia Garner of Swords to Plowshares, a nonprofit veterans advocacy group. “They should think about ways to rectify the wrongs that were done to those folks.”

“Continuing this work is not done,” she added. “They should look at people discriminated against before ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ as well.”

A Pentagon official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity and was not authorized to speak publicly about the announcement, said that 97 percent of the roughly 9,000 men and women kicked out under “don’t ask, don’t tell” who had served long enough to be eligible for honorable discharges had now received them.

The official said that there were no formal plans to look into additional cases, but that anyone who was discharged because of their sexual orientation was still eligible to apply for a review to potentially have their status upgraded.

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