No Longer Invisible — Why the Jax Act Matters for Women Who Served

Marianeth Crockett
Dec 4
3 min read

As a woman veteran, I know what it feels like to serve in a world where our contributions are often minimized or overlooked. But this isn’t my story alone, it’s the story of hundreds of women whose combat experiences were never fully acknowledged by the Departments of Defense (War) and Veterans Affairs.

A quiet injustice echoes throughout our veteran community, one that too many carried during training, overseas, and even after deployment—in silence: some women served side-by-side with elite Special Operations Forces (SOF) in Cultural Support Teams (CST) deployed to combat zones in order to engage with the female populations of foreign countries and later came home to official DoD paperwork that omitted that truth.

To ensure that certain members of the Armed Forces who served in female cultural support teams receive proper credit for such service (H.R. 1753 & S.2014) is what the JAX Act is doing.

What the Jax Act specifically does:

It requires that the military update official service records for women who served in “female cultural support teams” (CSTs) between 2010 and 2021 to reflect that they were deployed under combat conditions.
For CST veterans (or their survivors) whose prior VA disability or death-benefit claims were denied because their record lacked combat designation, this bill allows those claims to be resubmitted and reconsidered under the correct classification.
The bill also instructs the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to improve training and processing guidance for these claims and conduct outreach, so affected women are made aware of their rights.

In short: it doesn’t just update a file. It seeks to restore honor, access to care, and correct the system for those who were denied justice.

Why It’s Not Just Symbolic

Before CSTs, combat roles were written in narrow lines: mostly male, mostly conventional. But war evolved. The need for cultural understanding, for humane engagement, and for intelligence gathering among local female populations evolved and that need gave birth to CSTs. Women answered.

They trained hard. They deployed. They risked their lives—often under the same threats as any infantryman. And many came home wounded—physically, mentally, spiritually. Yet the system responded with outdated boxes: “support role,” “non-combat,” “no combat benefits.”

That’s a contradiction. Women veterans aren’t asking for a medal. We’re asking for truth. We’re asking for equal recognition. It’s asking for access to the care that these women earned with their sweat and sacrifice. And as a woman veteran, I say…hell yes!

What This Means for Women Veterans (And Why Everyone Should Care)

Women who served on CSTs now have a path to recognition that was denied. Some may finally get the VA benefits they’ve long needed.
Survivors of CST members who died or were disabled may now resubmit claims and receive benefits.
The legislation pushes the VA toward accountability, no more “mislabels" from the DoD, no more administrative mislabeling.
For the broader veteran community: it’s a statement that women’s service matters. Not in spite of being female. But because military combat and combat training service (including danger, sacrifice, mission) doesn’t care about gender.

What Others are Saying

Women veterans who bravely served our nation and fought for our freedoms deserve all of the recognition, benefits, and honor they earned, just like their male counterparts. Due to outdated policies, women veterans who were part of Cultural Support Teams and who served in combat are being denied rank, benefits, and critical health services. Senator Rosen

In closing

There’s no battlefield where paperwork deserved more weight than courage. The women of Cultural Support Teams stood in the shadows to do the hard, dangerous work. The Jax Act brings them into the light.

This isn’t about rewriting history. It’s about making right what was wrong. It’s about honoring warriors, female warriors, who served, bled, and carried burdens for our nation.

If we let this pass without action, we diminish not just them, but the promise of what equal service should mean.

I stand with them.

Every veteran deserves the respect they earned.

About the Author

A U.S. Navy veteran, Marianeth served as an Aircrewman-Loadmaster on C-130 aircraft, flying tactical logistics missions in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. She later worked in Operations and as a Public Affairs Officer—merging mission planning, aerospace coordination, and communications to support high-stakes operations. Her military service forged a resilient, mission-driven mindset that now anchors her leadership philosophy and approach to organizational strategy.