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Congressman Rick Nolan's letter on veterans

Rick Nolan had this in his weekly newsletter on May 14th. I believe that the President has nominated a VA Secretary since then but nothing else has changed.

Tim
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Dear Mr. King, 
After repeated campaign promises to “take care of our great, great, great Veterans,”the President has accomplished nothing at the Department of Veterans Affairs(VA) – other than presiding over the departure of two VA Secretaries and the voluntary withdrawal of a nominee not even remotely qualified to run an agency with a $180 billion annual budget and 380,000 employees.

So who’s minding the store at the VA? That’s hard to say. The President has yet to nominate a new VA Secretary two weeks after White House doctor Ronny Jackson withdrew his name from consideration. The key jobs of Undersecretary for Health, Undersecretary for Benefits, and Chief Information Officer in charge of medical records have yet to be filled. And the Washington Post is reporting that more than 30,000 clinical staff positions at VA clinics are vacant. These include thousands of doctors, nurses and mental health therapists.

Meanwhile, on average, 22 military Veterans are still committing suicide every day. The Veterans Choice program, intended to provide local medical care to Veterans who live far away from VA facilities, is still in disarray. Millions of Veterans are still waiting months to receive their Veterans ID cards because the online system can’t handle all the requests. And VA medical records are still being transferred on paper while the system awaits a ten-year, $16 billion online upgrade that’s been on hold pending appointment of a permanent VA Secretary. 

The VA and the heroes it serves deserve better than this from their President and their government. The fact of the matter is that the VA has trained more doctors and – in cooperation with the National Institutes of Health – accomplished more lifesaving medical research than any other institution in America. Military Veterans who have attended the Veterans Roundtables we’ve held throughout Minnesota’s 8th District generally go out of their way to praise the care they receive at VA health care facilities. 

That said, it’s clear that serious problems remain, and filling the Secretary’s position and all those other vacancies with highly qualified people of experience and integrity should be priority one for the President.

We will keep you posted as events proceed. Meanwhile, I want to hear your thoughts. Feel free to contact any of our offices listed below or send me an email.
Sincerely, 

Rick 

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