WASHINGTON _ The Navy won't return the ousted captain of the USS Theodore Roosevelt to the aircraft carrier that was hit hard by the coronavirus, according to two people familiar with the service's decision.
Capt. Brett Crozier will retain his rank but not return to the carrier, the people said. In addition, the commander of the Roosevelt strike group is having his promotion put on hold for now, according to one of the people.
Crozier was dismissed by then-acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly on April 2 for writing an impassioned memo beseeching the service to do more to remedy the increasingly dire situation aboard the carrier. The memo promptly leaked, and Modly said Crozier failed to keep his concerns within the chain of command.
Adm. Mike Gilday, the chief of naval operations, started reviewing the investigation into the events surrounding the outbreak of COVID-19 at the end of May.
The carrier set sail from Guam after about two months in port. The crew underwent training exercises in social distancing and mitigation procedures and the ship is operating under a newly implemented COVID-19 standard operating procedure, the Navy said.
In Crozier's memo, which leaked to the San Francisco Chronicle, he said, "We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die." Crozier's main request _ that the vast majority of the crew be taken off the ship so the spread of the virus could be slowed and the ship cleaned _ has now been fulfilled.
The Navy said all of the Roosevelt's crew members had been tested for COVID-19, with more than 1,000 positive cases. One sailor from the Roosevelt died after receiving treatment in intensive care on Guam, according to the Navy.
The Navy has reported 2,850 cases so far, out of 8,824 for the U.S. military as a whole, according to the Pentagon.
The Roosevelt wasn't the only vessel that had to return to port after an outbreak. The Navy said in April that the USS Kidd was doing so because 18 sailors on the destroyer tested positive for the coronavirus, with more expected. In an apparent reference to the Navy's response to the outbreak on the Roosevelt, Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said at the time that the Navy, "using lessons learned from other cases," responded quickly and flew a specialized medical evaluation team onto the Kidd to conduct testing.
Modly resigned April 7 after controversy over his decision to oust Crozier was compounded by his trip to the carrier where he denounced the former captain to his crew. Audio recordings surfaced of Modly saying that Crozier was "too naive or too stupid" to lead the ship.
President Donald Trump told reporters at a White House briefing April 7 that he "had no role" in Modly's resignation and that the secretary "did that just to end that problem."
Trump has sent mixed messages about Crozier, saying he didn't deserve to have his previously exemplary career ended but also that "I don't think the captain should have been writing letters. He's not Ernest Hemingway."
The Roosevelt episode has underscored broader turmoil in the Navy's leadership and its relations with Trump. Modly had served as acting secretary since November. His predecessor as Navy secretary, Richard Spencer, was fired amid a Pentagon dust-up over Trump's insistence that a Navy SEAL acquitted of murder should be allowed to keep a Trident decoration signifying his service.
