We all remember the days during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic when the pressure to get vaxxed was increasing by the day. People were threatened, bullied, coerced, and even fired from their jobs if they refused the jab.
It took courage to choose bodily autonomy over blind compliance.
One person who took the bold path of nonconformity is Asa Miller, a former Navy SEAL who was launched into a legal battle with the Biden administration when he refused to get the vaccine.
Steve Deace invites Asa on the show to tell his story.
Growing up in a military family with a father who served 27 years in the Marine Corps, Asa knew from a young age that he would follow a similar path. After high school, he went straight into Navy SEAL training. Unfortunately, his first deployment cycle happened to coincide with the initial hysteria of COVID-19.
“During that time, we were presented with the choice of whether or not to receive the COVID vaccine,” says Asa. “I chose to stand against it, and thankfully, 20 other of my brothers were right there with me.”
However, their “choice” turned out to be rather the illusion of choice.
When a few members of Asa’s team tested positive, despite being asymptomatic or having minor symptoms, officials used it as an opportunity to “force people into solitary confinement.” They even “started a rumor that if you didn’t get the Johnson and Johnson vaccine that had just come out, you’d be stuck in Somalia and would not be able to come home,” Asa recounts.
Despite the coercion, Asa and many of his fellow SEALs continued to refuse the jab.
Asa had “no issues coming home.” However, upon his return, “that’s when the mRNA vaccines started coming out,” which the government immediately began to push. Considering “[his] experience on deployment” and “the early science” behind the new vaccines, Asa stood his ground and refused the jab again.
“I quickly realized that not only was it illegal to mandate these vaccines, but it was also, in my opinion as a Christian, immoral because of their use of aborted fetal cells … so for both legal reasons and my own sincerely held religious beliefs, I decided not to receive these vaccines,” he tells Steve.
That’s when it became abundantly clear that there was never any “choice” at all. When Asa and his fellow nonconformists filed for religious exemptions, “they were all denied.”
“We were all removed from our SEAL team and threatened with punishments ranging from paying back all of our training costs, which reach into the hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars,” to “being put in the brig” and even being “dishonorably discharged” – a consequence of the highest caliber that can permanently prevent a veteran from owning firearms, voting, being employed at certain places, and receiving veteran’s benefits.
Even so, Asa and his brothers stood firm in their decision.
Thankfully, others began rallying behind them.
“We actually were able to get ahold of Tucker Carlson, who broke the story for us on Fox News,” which created enough “public awareness” to actually “start the fight,” says Asa.
And that fight is far from over.
While Asa was able to avoid dishonorable discharge, some of his fellow SEAL members weren’t so fortunate.
“I know people who were kicked out early, [people] who had to pay back tens of thousands of dollars in bonus money,” and people who were given “an RE-4 on their discharge,” which places them “in the same category as sexual offenders,” says Asa, adding that “there are also 8,500 service members across all the different branches who were kicked out – some of which received dishonorable discharges, which more or less is the same as having a felony.”
“My goal right now is to be able to tell the story and be a spokesperson for those people who were kicked out and have not received the restitution they deserve, but also to point to the fact that if Congress had not been forced to act, over 250,000 service members would have been kicked out for simply holding to their sincerely held religious beliefs, and I think that's the most important thing,” he says.
“The fight is over fundamental rights; it’s not just vaccines. … Our senior military leadership, our current administration, and the established political order are rejecting our Constitutional laws.”
To hear more of Asa’s story and where he’s at now, watch the clip below.
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