In times of change, how should the VA move ahead? An expert weighs in.

And welcome back. John, let me leave on this. Where do we go from here? Talk about where you take this to Capitol Hill, what the response is, and how this helps craft the budget as we go ahead to fiscal 2026 at a time when all the budgets are uncertain right now

I think where we go with this is to continue to share this with Congress and to show the urgency in maintaining our steadfast direction of supporting our veteran population

Our service disabled veterans really need to have this continuity of care, this confidence in the VA system that they've shown they trust

And we need to continue to move forward. And we really need to ensure that Congress understands their investments that they've done throughout the years

They are the right investments. They're going in the right direction. It's going to take us time, but they can't stop

They cannot waver on this. This is a promise, and we've heard in a very bipartisan manner that this is a promise that they want to keep

So we're going to hold them to that. But what we're doing is we're providing this roadmap for them

From a perspective of three veteran service organizations that do this every day, we provide advocacy and we provide guidance for our service-disabled veterans to how to get the best care and to have the confidence in the VA health care system and the partnerships that they have

along with having confidence that Congress does have our back. And I think that's the biggest thing is that we want to ensure

that everyone can go to DAV.org if they want to see the copy of the independent budget And along with going to DAV you also see our critical policy goals kind of outlining what are our priorities from our membership So we also encourage Congress to do the same thing because those critical policy goals and what in this

is actually coming from our members. I do hope that viewers go and read this because it's a very

interesting document. It does lay out very well where all the needs are and what you guys are

seeing. We've been doing this long enough that we get into these cycles where we hear lawmakers

talk about needing to crack down on some of that VA funding. VA funding goes up every year. We've

got to start to rein it in. It doesn't ever seem to get to that point. We do seem to see every year

another generous increase in the VA budget. I wonder if you think that's just this message

this message of this is what the importance is. No one wants to be seen as the person who

abandons veterans. And when you guys lay these out, it does seem that you're justifying the need

for these continued increases, even when other agencies are seeing cuts. Yes, and I think this budget also goes in line with, if you look at the history of the VA

and their budget issues, we just recently had the shortfall. Yeah. And that is what we're trying to avoid

We need to make sure that we have mandatory funding for all of VA benefits

and the Health Administration, along with the National Cemetery. So we need to make sure that they're doing everything correctly

so that we avoid these shortfalls. Veterans benefits should not have shortfalls

neither should health care, or even when we put them to rest. So this is a good reminder for them of looking at it in a very holistic manner

to make sure that they're not missing things that will take care of the veterans from beginning to end