Into the NDAA weeds

President Joe Biden yesterday sent a memorandum to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin "on the Prescription of Method of Designating a Member of the Military Sentencing Parameters and Criteria Board." That board was created by the FY22 National Defense Authorization Act. The memo reads as follows:

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 539E(e)(4)(B) of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022, Public Law 117-81, 135 Stat. 1541, 1700 (2021), I hereby order as follows:

(1)  If the chief trial judges designated under article 26(g) of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, 10 U.S.C. 826(g), do not include a trial judge of the Navy, then the Judge Advocate General of the Navy shall designate as a voting member of the Military Sentencing Parameters and Criteria Board (Board) either the Chief Judge of the Department of the Navy or a Navy trial judge assigned to the Navy and Marine Corps Trial Judiciary.

(2)  If the chief trial judges designated under article 26(g) of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, 10 U.S.C. 826(g), do not include a trial judge of the Marine Corps, then the Staff Judge Advocate to the Commandant of the Marine Corps, in consultation with the Judge Advocate General of the Navy, shall designate as a voting member of the Board a Marine Corps trial judge assigned to the Navy and Marine Corps Trial Judiciary.

This memorandum constitutes the regulations provided for in subsections (ii) and (iii) of section 539E(e)(4)(B) of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022.

You are authorized and directed to publish this memorandum in the Federal Register.       

The purpose seems to be to ensure that, come what may, the board will include both a Navy and a Marine Corps military judge as voting members. Perhaps some day the explanatory memo that presented this document to the President for signature will be made public.