President Donald Trump on Wednesday pardoned a former junior Army officer who was found guilty in a 2022 court-martial of violating orders to comply with COVID-19 safety measures, a White House official confirmed to Military.com.
Former 1st Lt. Mark Bashaw, who served as an entomologist at the Army Public Health Center at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, was convicted on two counts of violating lawful orders for refusing to telework, submit a negative COVID-19 test and wear a mask indoors, part of the installation’s requirements at the time for unvaccinated service members.
The military judge who presided over the trial, Col. Robert Cohen, declined to punish Bashaw, but the former officer — who had been a noncommissioned officer in the Air Force before joining the Army — said that he was discharged from the military in 2023 following his sentencing.
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“I just received a presidential pardon from President Donald J. Trump,” Bashaw said on social media Wednesday. “I am humbled, grateful, and ready to continue fighting for truth and justice in this great nation.”
Bashaw’s case marked the first known court-martial over COVID-19 mandate violations. The Pentagon dropped the military COVID-19 vaccination mandate in 2023 following legislation from Congress.
According to data provided by the services to Military.com in January, roughly 8,200 service members were separated from the military over their refusal to receive the COVID-19 vaccination. Troops who were booted over the refusal have been able to return to service since 2023 but, as of April, just over 100 had come back.
In January, Trump issued an executive order laying the groundwork to offer more incentives for returning service members separated over their refusal, such as back pay, but that also came with multiyear service commitments and deductions to wages earned by the service member while they were separated, Military.com previously reported.
Bashaw requested a religious exemption to the COVID-19 vaccination, citing his Christian beliefs and adding that he would “rely on my God-given immune system,” Stars and Stripes reported in 2022. As of that year, 12,000 service members had requested a religious exemption, with the vast majority being denied.
The COVID-19 virus has resulted in more than 1.2 million deaths in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as of Saturday.
A total of 690 troops, dependents and civilians working for the Department of Defense died from the virus between 2020 and 2022, according to the Pentagon, which stopped publishing updates that year.
Though Bashaw was not formally punished following his court-martial, his conviction left him with a criminal record, which is now wiped clean after the presidential pardon.
An Army spokesperson told Military.com following Bashaw’s trial that “a court-martial conviction carries lifelong collateral consequences of a federal conviction, beyond punishment imposed by the court.”
“Some examples may include social consequences and difficulty in obtaining future employment,” Amburr Reese, the spokesperson, said, “as criminal convictions are generally public information and frequently reported in federal and state criminal and licensing databases.”
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