Whistleblowers are raising concerns about the quality of food being served to members of the National Guard who are stationed in Washington, D.C. One source sent photos of moldy and undercooked food to WLUC and said that the food has made several troops sick.
According to The Detroit News, another soldier echoed those complaints in a letter to a lawmaker.
"Multiple soldiers have been getting sick and vomiting after eating, and most of the food is being thrown away," one soldier wrote in a message to a lawmaker. "Morale is very bad; many have served overseas and cannot believe the quality of food they are being fed here."
Michigan Rep. Jack Bergman said that he visited with the troops stationed in the Capitol and was told that the issues with the food quality have been fixed.
"Per the soldiers, the food issues have been remedied, but we are still looking into it as a team to see how this happened and ensure this doesn't happen again. As he has made very clear, Rep. Bergman believes it's past time to get our National Guard troops back home to Michigan," Bergman's Communications Director, James Hogge, told WLUC.
Despite Bergman's visit last week, it appears there are still issues with the food. Over the weekend, soldiers reported finding metal shavings in their food and had to discard at least 74 meals. As a result, many of the troops stationed in Washington, D.C., are spending their own money on food.
Michigan Senator Gary Peters, who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee, is calling for the National Guard to cancel the contract with the food service provider and wants to provide the soldiers with a per diem to cover the cost of buying food.
"While I understand the ad hoc nature of these deployments and appreciate the tremendous efforts made by many of those under your command, it is simply unacceptable that these men and women are being fed chicken with the feathers still attached and raw ground beef and then, to add insult to injury, they are forced to purchase food with their own money," Peters wrote in a letter to Acting Secretary of the Army John E. Whitley and General Daniel R. Hokanson, chief of the National Guard.
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