Shortly before Crozier’s letter became public, the Pentagon had already moved to stop reports of illness on bases from reaching the public, saying that they were concerned about messages that the military wasn’t able to retain “readiness” due to outbreaks of COVID-19. Crozier’s letter, first published in the San Francisco Chronicle, spoke directly to the need to quarantine everyone aboard the Roosevelt after at least 100 sailors tested positive for the novel coronavirus. “Keeping over 4,000 young men and women on board the TR is an unnecessary risk,” wrote Crozier, “and breaks faith those Sailors entrusted to our care.”

From the tone of Crozier’s missive, it seemed that he had been expressing his concerns to the chain of command with little effect. On Thursday, Modly said that Crozier was being removed from the Roosevelt because of a “loss of trust and confidence.” This doesn’t seem to be a loss on the part of the crew that Crozier moved forcefully to protect, but on Modly and those reporting to Trump who were embarrassed to be caught out without a plan for dealing with an aggressively contagious disease on ships where privacy and personal space is pretty well nonexistent.

As Reuters reports, Biden responded by saying that, in going after Crozier, “Donald Trump’s Acting Navy Secretary shot the messenger—a commanding officer who was faithful to both his national security mission and his duty to care for his sailors, and who rightly focused attention on a broader concern about how to maintain military readiness during this pandemic.” By dismissing Crozier, Modly and Trump aren’t protecting that readiness, but making it clear that sailor’s lives are secondary to projecting an false image that everything is just fine.

Brett Crozier has served in the Navy for 28 years after graduating the service academy in Annapolis and becoming a naval aviator. He served as a pilot aboard the USS Nimitz, commander of strike fighter squadron in the Pacific, the executive officer of the USS Ronald Reagan, and the captain of 7th Fleet flagship USS Blue Ridge before taking command of the Roosevelt in 2018.

Now Modly has ended that career … because Crozier dared speak up to protect his 4,700 sailors.