‘Too many’ U.S. Coast Guard employees feel unsafe, internal review finds after recent revelations about rapes and sexual harassment

The wide-ranging 90-day review, released Wednesday, calls for an end to a “permissive environment” that extends to inappropriate jokes and comments, and a greater focus on preventing “inappropriate or unhealthy behavior” at the earliest stages.

Many of the recommendations in the report stem from interviews with hundreds of Coast Guard members at locations throughout the service, including from victims of sexual assault and harassment dating from the 1960s to the present.

“These victims expressed deep rooted feelings of pain and a loss of trust in the organization,” the report says. “Acknowledging this broken trust is an important first step in reestablishing it.”

The review was ordered by Adm. Linda Fagan, commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard, after the service came under fire for not widely disclosing a six-year internal investigation into dozens of cases of sexual assault and harassment at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in Connecticut from 1988 to 2006.

The investigation, first revealed by CNN, was known as “Operation Fouled Anchor” and identified 62 substantiated incidents of rape, sexual assault and sexual harassment that occurred at the New London academy, or by academy cadets.

U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut and chair of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security, criticized the new review in a statement Wednesday, saying it “still does not hold anyone accountable for past failures – particularly those at the Coast Guard Academy.”

U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, also a Democrat from Connecticut, said it was “unacceptable” the report did not recommend accountability measures for that past “misconduct and coverup.”

Murphy said that while it…