J.M. Phelps continued his sob stories of the deliberately unvaxxed in an Oct. 24 WorldNetDaily article:
Joshua Zermeno, a former officer in the U.S. Space Force, detailed in a previous interview with WorldNetDaily how his opposition to the 2021 COVID-19 shot mandate led to his forced departure from the military after 13 years of honorable service, and also his difficulty in rejoining the military now that President Donald Trump is commander-in-chief.
Now, even though Trump and War Secretary Pete Hegseth have promised to restore service members adversely affected by the shot mandate, he tells WND that, when it comes to the military bureaucracy tasked with actually implementing Trump and Hegseth’s mandate, the foot-dragging process almost seems “intentionally designed to discourage people from returning to service.”
Zermeno explained this painstaking process, noting that many other former service members are experiencing similar problems. Although the War Department pledged on Sept. 3 to establish a task force to assist individuals seeking reinstatement into the military, nearly two months later no such task force has been created. Like so many others, he has been left to essentially fight this battle alone.
As we documented, Zermeno revealed in that previous WND interview that he self-published a book in which he purported to justify his refusal to take the vaccine, dishonestly framing it as an “unlawful order.” No further explanation for Zermeno’s refusal is provided in this article.
Phelps continued to grouse about the mandate in a Nov. 11 article:
For all the Trump administration’s efforts to strengthen and revitalize the U.S. military following its disastrous, DEI-infected leadership under the Biden administration, service members are making it clear that real accountability regarding the military’s highly controversial – and enormously damaging – COVID-19 shot mandate must be forthcoming for members’ trust to be restored.
The many adverse effects linked to the COVID-19 shot have left service members feeling disillusioned. After all, thousands lost their careers, their rank, their pay and more, leading them to call for accountability from those who mandated and enforced the shot. Without real accountability, countless service members claim they cannot restore their trust in the military. Indeed, many members admit they will not recommend for their family or friends to join the military.
Phelps did not explain how the entire Pentagon leadership was “disastrous” and “DEI-infected,” let alone explain how those conditions harmed the military. He then offered a self-conducted “survey” he conducted:
A small, independent, unscientific survey recently conducted by this reporter, just to ascertain the unvarnished views of dozens of current service members, supports this contention. Sixty-three out of 66 respondents, 95% – who were actively serving in the U.S. military – agreed that, on the heels of the tyrannical enforcement of the COVID-19 shot, including the refusal to honor religious exemption requests, accountability now is a must for them to regain trust in America’s armed services.
The 2025 survey can be contrasted with a prior survey from 2023, homing in on issues such as trust in leadership as it relates to one’s ability to follow their oath to the Constitution and more. Factors affecting the decrease in survey participants in 2025 compared to 2023 – some had since resigned, retired or been discharged from the military due to the COVID-19 mandate -were addressed in a prior WorldNetDaily article concerning force readiness and more.
In the 2023 survey during the Biden administration, virtually all respondents – 226 out of 229 (97%) – said they did not trust their senior leaders at the Department of Defense (general rank and flag officers) to follow their oaths to the Constitution and obey all laws. In the 2025 survey, which had a smaller number of participants, 62 out of 66 respondents (94%) shared the same sentiment of distrust towards their leaders in the recently renamed Department of War.
Phelps failed to mention that the troops he’s trying to lionize demonstrated distrust by violating the vaccine order, and the “many adverse effects” he claims exists are not described, let alone proven.
Phelps groused further in a Nov. 22 article:
Although the U.S. military’s mandate that service members receive the COVID-19 shot, implemented under the Biden administration, has been widely deemed “unlawful as implemented,” and while many calls have since emerged for pardons or amnesty for those service members negatively impacted, these urgent requests have largely been ignored.
On June 2, 2025, representatives from Stand Together Against Racism and Radicalism in the Services, Inc. (STARRS), the MacArthur Society of West Point Graduates and the Calvert Task Group signed on to a letter sent to President Donald Trump.
The letter accurately stated that “mandatory COVID shots from 2021 to 2023, as well as the earlier anthrax vaccinations from 1997 to 2003, were formally declared by federal officials to be ‘unlawful as implemented’ and ‘illegal,’ respectively.”
It was not explained how, exactly, the vaccine mandated was deemed “‘unlawful as implemented’ and ‘illegal,’ respectively.”