A wannabe-G.I. Jane’s dream of changing into the primary feminine Navy S.E.A.L. ended as a result of navy recruiters delayed her software so lengthy that she aged out, she claimed in a lawsuit.
The US Navy officers didn’t advance Amanda S. Reynolds’ software, then advised her within the fall that she would not qualify for Naval Officer Coaching Command in Newport, RI, as a result of she’d be over the age restrict of 42 by the point she graduated, in accordance with court docket papers.
“The chance . . . was type of taken away from me. I would love that to be reinstated,” Reynolds, 41, advised The Submit. “I’d similar to the result to be decided by the deserves as a substitute of by some type of technicality.
“I may have gone to officer candidate college in February, [but] they delayed my software with out motive or trigger after which they advised me I used to be too previous,” she stated.
The Lengthy Island lawyer first sought to affix the Navy in 2018.
“I used to be working in litigation for 12 years, and I type of received burnt out working 24/7,” the Woodbury resident stated, calling the SEALs “such a extra noble trigger.”
An avid long-distance runner and swimmer who’s SCUBA licensed, Reynolds stated the particular forces “type of jibed with my bodily pursuits.”
In a private assertion submitted as a part of her efforts to enlist, Reynolds wrote of her “Viking-like pursuit” to be a SEAL.
“As an American, I used to be born with what I can solely describe as an inexpressible, indefatigable nature to dream,” she wrote. “And so, dream I do — by no means forgetting it is just below the auspices of this nice nation’s navy who protects my inalienable proper to take action that I could.”
Service runs within the household, Reynolds stated. Her grandfather served within the Norwegian Ski Patrol; her uncle was an American World Struggle II pilot shot down within the Pacific, and her older brother is an FBI agent.
“I hope to function this nation’s first feminine Navy SEAL Officer, in order that there could also be a second, and a 3rd, and an infinitesimal many extra feminine candidates who would possibly impress upon you these shared values in the exact same means,” she wrote.
However her dream stalled virtually from the get-go.
Reynolds, who’s representing herself in her Brooklyn Federal Courtroom age-discrimination case towards the US Navy, claimed she was “sworn into” the Navy in Brooklyn in 2018 however “was by no means assigned wherever or deployed.”
Reynolds stuffed out “enlistment paperwork” in 2019, in accordance with the Navy, which had “no document of service” for her.
She then moved to Utah the place she labored as a lawyer and revisited her enlistment in 2020. However she was was arrested in July 2020 for allegedly driving below the affect, a misdemeanor which was dismissed in 2023, court docket data present.
She returned to Lengthy Island and once more chased her desires of becoming a member of the SEALs, however discovered recruiters had been fast to induce her to make use of her authorized expertise within the navy’s Choose Advocate Common.
She claims recruiters advised her that “age waivers had been at all times obtainable.”
“I used to be actually gearing as much as take part within the pipeline course of, actually taking all the appropriate steps to proceed with the appliance,” she stated. However the app “was not submitted” by recruiters and “unjustifiably delayed,” she claimed.
The Navy declined touch upon the litigation.
The Protection Division opened the navy’s elite items, such because the SEALs and the Military’s Inexperienced Berets, to ladies in 2016 however no girl has ever completed the method to develop into a SEAL.
“It was by no means actually about me being a feminine SEAL, it was nearly me being a SEAL who occurred to be a lady,” she stated.
