US Coast Guard

Coast Guard Cadet Who Was Expelled for Having a Child Settles Lawsuit

The Coast Guard Academy prohibits cadets from having children, a policy that was introduced in the late 1970s, just after the academy began admitting women

AP Photo/Stephen Dunn, File

A U.S. Coast Guard Academy cadet who was expelled for becoming a father will get his degree as part of a legal settlement, his attorneys said Thursday.

Isaak Olson, from Whittier, California, sued the academy in December after years of endeavoring to be reinstated as a cadet. He was two months from graduating, with a degree in mechanical engineering and a commission as an officer, when he disclosed in 2014 that his fiancée had given birth to their first child in violation of policy that prohibits students from being parents, according the lawsuit.

“No one should ever have to choose between the honor of being a Coast Guard cadet and the honor of being a parent," Olson said Thursday in a statement released by his lawyers. He said he was "thankful the academy has reached a settlement that recognizes my right to both.”

The Coast Guard Academy confirmed the settlement but didn't give details.

Olson was expelled under an academy regulation that barred cadets from having “any maternal or paternal obligation or responsibility," according to the lawsuit. Olson's lawyers said the policy still stands.

The ban was introduced in the late 1970s, just after the academy began admitting women.

Olson met his girlfriend when they both attended La Serna High School, in Whittier. They continued their relationship after he enrolled at the academy and she at Westmont College in Santa Barbara. They planned to marry upon graduation.

Olson learned of his fiancée’s pregnancy in April of his junior year, according to the lawsuit. She decided not to have an abortion and he decided not to resign because that would have meant allowing the academy to recoup the cost of his education, estimated at up to $500,000, according to the lawsuit.

His fiancée gave birth in August 2013, in California; Olson was present at the birth, then returned to the academy in New London, Connecticut, for his senior year.

Seven months later, in March 2014, Olson was filling out the screening application for his first duty assignment, aboard a Coast Guard cutter. It was the first time he had been asked about dependents, and he disclosed that he had a child, according to the lawsuit. He was then told he would not graduate or receive a commission.

The couple had Olson’s parental rights terminated in hopes of enabling him to graduate, and he later went through a long administrative process to try to get his status restored, to no avail, according to his lawyers at the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Connecticut, and Yale Law School’s Veterans Legal Services Clinic.

During the administrative limbo of the following months, Olson was initially forbidden to marry his fiancée, as he was technically still a cadet and thus required to remain single. Days before the planned wedding, in June 2014, he was told by the academy that he could go ahead with it.

Along the way, Olson enlisted in the Coast Guard, and the couple had another child, the attorneys said. He is now an aviation maintenance technician, stationed in Alaska.

The lawsuit sought his commission and back pay, since he makes about $3,000 less than he would if he had been granted his commission as an officer. The ACLU said there is no financial component to the settlement, but it does include a statement that will allow him to apply to be commissioned as an officer.

“Becoming a parent shouldn’t be seen as a hardship,” Olson said in his statement. “I look forward to the day that cadets are given the same rights as the rest of the service.”

The federal law that funded and authorized the Defense Department for the 2022 fiscal year gives the military until the end of December to craft “regulations that include the option to preserve parental guardianship rights” for cadets or midshipmen who become pregnant or father children while at one of the department's service academies.

The law applies to the U.S. Military Academy, the Naval Academy and the Air Force Academy — but not to the Coast Guard Academy, which is run by the Department of Homeland Security.

The academy said in a statement that there is ongoing litigation on the subject, so it wouldn't comment.

The Associated Press/NBC
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