VA staffing cuts won’t hurt care says House Veterans’ Committee Chairman

Here today with Chairman Mike Boss of the House Veterans Affairs Committee

Thank you so much for sitting down with us. Glad to be with you. Thank you. I wanted to start off by talking to you just generally about the state of the VA

I know you're working on a lot of different bills in the committee right now, and there's a lot of plans for ways to improve VA, ways to move more benefits, more access to folks

But I guess I want to start with what is the need there

Where do you think VA is? Is it an institution that needs really massive reforms right now

or are we talking about just piecemeal improvements or small steps to make it more efficient for veterans

Yeah, let me just say this. What has happened in the VA

and this is the improvements that need to be. For some reason over the years

the VA has unfortunately shifted to the fact that many people believe that the VA was created for the VA

The VA has not been created for the VA. The VA is created for the veteran

to provide services for the veteran and to do it for the quality of care that the veteran can receive

or the benefits that the veteran must receive. Unfortunately, we've had an overgrowth of bureaucracy

and whenever the arguments come up, and no one wants change. That is the argument from the other side

We do want change. We want to make it better. We want to make it better for the veteran

We want to make it so that it actually is that our money that we spend is spent wisely to provide for the veteran, not just to grow a bureaucracy

So you're going to hear some of the screaming back and forth of people because they're looking for items that say, oh, no, you can't do that

That's going to hurt the veteran. No, it's not. Our intent is to make it better for the veteran So radical change No The services are still going to be provided Is there going to be change so that not only the veterans receive better benefits

receives their benefits on time, receives quality health care, and receives it when and where they want it? That's what we want to see

So I guess the question becomes, is VA close to providing that now

or was VA close to providing that with the last administration? Because we were seeing the trust scores going up

We were saying, I think it was 92% of folks at the end of last year were saying that they had faith that VA could provide their benefits

We've heard from a lot of veterans groups, hey, we like what VA has. Sure, it could be improved

But with Secretary Collins coming in, there has been more of a shift of those things aren't being provided, that the benefits aren't there

We really need to rethink things. Let's show some things that are not being provided by law

we actually intercepted communication from the former undersecretary that basically said on the

mission act whenever we're talking about community care whatever you do don't allow them to hit the

easy button that's a problem because congress was very very clear in the mission act and that's why

i have the asset act um if you remember we started out as a choice act that wasn't implemented

correctly by the bureaucrats. Then we went to the Mission Act. Well, now the Mission Act has allowed

for several of our business to make clear decisions to slow walk the opportunity for our veterans to

receive care in the community when maybe it's a longer drive or a further distance to the VA facility

Or they drag their feet and say, oh, it's going to be a couple months, but

that it'd be a couple months if you went out to the in in the community so these type problems we

must correct and must make sure that the law is being followed unfortunately quite often with the bureaucrats at va we discovered that they think law is suggestion It not a suggestion it a law

Congress has made a decision to put these things in place, and it's for the betterment of the veteran

that we make those choices to put them in place. I think that's what you're going to see

with this administration and Undersecretary Collins, because he has made the same statement that I made

which is the VA is not created for the bureaucrats, it's created for the service of the veteran

And he also said to the employees that if you're not here and have a passion to serve our veterans, move on down the road

Because we want people in all the way down to the front worker that has the veterans benefit at heart

The service to the veteran is what they really need to be focused on. So is there any concern, and I do want to get back to the Access Act in just a minute

But before that, because there has been so much talk about these potential cuts at VA in terms of the staffing, even larger in the federal government, just some of the reorganization that the Trump administration has done

Do you worry that some of the messaging here is going to scare away folks who are dedicated to that mission and who do want to stay

Or is it really just pushing that message out to make sure that the deadweight, the problem employees get out of there, but protecting those ones

Because right now it feels like a lot of the messaging has become a tax on federal employees

rather than refining or perfecting the federal floor. Well, let's look at this

The people on the other side of the aisle want to use these as fear tactics. I called them out on it over and over again

And it's the only thing they really have is to try to use fear tactics. The amount of people that have been let go at the VA is minimal

No and I trust Secretary Collins that he has said that no one is going to lose their benefits We going to provide good quality care

What we're doing is we're realigning so that it can be done correctly

It can be done efficiently. And the best for the veteran. Now, let me tell you that there was that leaked memo

which was leaked by upper-level administrators in VA, was to bring them to the table, and they're in the early stages of any plan

The amount that was said in that memo is not the actual amount or what they're going to do

We're still in the... It was to bring people to the table

Let me tell you why. So if you have an agency, or if you're head of one of the agencies

you're one of the upper echelon people at VA. And the boss said, hey, we want to try to see where we're going to be more efficient

How can we reduce staffing? They're going to come back and say, oh, I can reduce it by two, but that's all I can do

By him putting the memo out, which should have stayed in-house, okay, but it did not

he has now brought them to the table to implement a plan

We don't know what that plan is. But with the plan, one thing he said about the plan is

we're not going to reduce benefits. We're going to make sure that the veteran is provided for

that their health care will be provided for them when, where, and how they need it based on their doctor's advice through the VA

And under no circumstances are we talking privatization. Let me say that again

Under no circumstances are we talking privatization. And this has been something that the other side of the aisle has screamed for years

Oh, you want to privatize? No, no, no. But we're not here to defend the bureaucrat

We're here to defend the veteran