Military Counseling Program

National Lawyers Guild

Do you want out of the military?

We're here to help. 877-447-4487

GI Rights and Military Discharge Program

Suicide Hotline

1-800-SUICIDE (784-2433)

If you - or someone you know - are having thoughts about suicide, call 1.800.SUICIDE (784-2433). Calls are connected to a certified crisis center nearest the caller's location. Services are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Soldier

Getting Out: A Guide to Military Discharges

* This booklet provides information on administrative discharges from the US military. No discharge is easy to get but with the information in this guide you can be well prepared for seeking an administrative discharge.

* Before you try to get any of the discharges described in this booklet, contact the GI Rights Hotline at 877-447-4487 (if you are outside the US call 215 563-4620). A counselor can discuss the various discharges with you, help you decide if one is good for you, explain procedures, work with you to gather the necessary documents, and support you throughout the process.

Getting Out: A Guide to Military Discharges

.pdf of Getting Out.

Portland, OR

503-223-3656

Mission

The Lewis & Clark Military Counseling Project is an Oregon based counseling service operated as a student-collective and a subset of the student chapter of the National Lawyers' Guild. The project aims to (1) counter-recruit the military's effort to swindle, coerce, and deceive the youth of America into entering military service (see below); and (2) provide direct counseling and information to GI's attempting to withdraw from military service.

Using resources provided by the Central Committtee for Constientious Objectors and the GI Rights hotline, the program assists servicepersons in contientious objection claims, disability discharges, hardship separation, fraudulent/defective enlistment, AWOL information, and more. Contact us, and a Military Counselor will return your call by the next business day.

Recent military deployments in Afghanistan, Iraq, and around the world, has sparked a massive increase in volume of calls received at th GI Rights Hotline. Service members and their families worried about call-ups and interested in discharges are in desparate need of assistance. Furthermore, recent surveys have shown that a large percentage of active and reserve members are not seeking re-enlistment when their tour is finished. The counseling program aims to address these concerns and problems.

Youth Outreach

The Program also seeks to challenge the instituionalized "poverty draft" by empowering youths with all correct and relevant information concerning military enlistment. Our Speakers Bureau will discuss many facts and patterns that a military recruiter would not cover such as: the lack of job training, sexual assualt, chemical exposure, and the college myth. We also provide information tables at events and festivals. For more information please call 503.810.3380.

NEWS UPDATES: "Stop Loss" Lawsuit

About half a dozen NLG students at Lewis & Clark contributed research to this groundbreaking legal challenge to the military's "Stop Loss" program. Under the program, tens of thousands of soldiers have been prevented from retiring or leaving the military upon completing their enlistment terms so that they may be deployed to Iraq. The petition asserts that the program is arbitrary, unfair, and unauthorized by law. The stop loss program has been widely criticized as a “backdoor draft.” Check out this link to the Oregonian article about the case. View the complaint at Law Offices of Michael Sorgen.