At his town hall Wednesday night in Conroe, Texas, Rep. Morgan Luttrell (R-TX) was pressed by a veteran about cuts to the VA and the GOP budget ending the cap on overdraft fees.
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00:00Thank you for giving me an opportunity. I'm a vet, U.S. Army vet. I worked in Army Intelligence, and I lit up our enemies every day. I was happy to do it.
00:14I have two quick questions. One, okay, so I hear about DOGE, but I don't ever hear about the pharmaceutical industry. I don't ever hear about health care. I don't ever hear about defense contractors, because there's plenty of waste, water, and abuse there. But yet, we cut the VA.
00:35Okay, now, okay, why aren't we going after them? The second question is, I heard that this new budget that passed lifted the cap on overdraft fees at banks.
00:51So, our poor elderly, who may have a bounced check, are now going to be charged with exorbitant fees. I want that cap put back on to where banks are forced to do this in a reasonable manner.
01:08Okay, we did not make any cuts to VA. Matter of fact, we did not make cuts to the VA.
01:24Okay, I thought you were talking about VA bills. Okay. Hang on. The healthcare space is being addressed through the Secretary. That's on TV every single day.
01:48The Department of Defense, as far as permitting reform and how it engages with public private institutes, is that kind of the granular part of your question?
01:59We're moving legislation to clean that system up as best we possibly can. As far as the VA goes, matter of fact, in February, the VA processed over 1 million disability claims.
02:111 million. And the VA trajectory, again, I haven't had the Secretary sit in front of me yet, but it is, and if it folds, I can assure you I'll be the one wild brushing.
02:25And I have never been a stranger in doing that. I do, religiously, do it.
02:34As far as government, you're talking about the body, the bodies, is that what you're referring to?
02:43The people who are being fired and at first services are better.
02:47I understand. And thus far, the trajectory is still continuing to move upwards.
02:54With less people.
02:55Yes, with less people. So we're not spending much federal dollars instead of getting the same thing back.
03:00Thank you for a long and long course of the year. I know, right?
03:03Well, I get you. Are you a CBOC guy over here? If you go to Conor, you go to, you go to, you go to, um, DeBakey.
03:09I know, I know.
03:10Okay. Conor is the best CBOC almost in the country.
03:14Okay. Well, I'm more soon to be there, but I want that for everyone.
03:17Yes, I'm sure. I'm sure. I got you.
03:20But, hey, let's not, and it's because the challenging part is every single VA is different.
03:24Everyone. From our CBOC to DeBakey, there's 172 VA facilities. Every single one of them is different.
03:31We can absolutely do my best to address the problem sets that exist in each one.
03:37That's 478,000 employees across the entire country.
03:42And I've only been doing this for two years without trying.
03:45Okay. What about the overdraft fees?
03:47Oh, okay. That's been lifted off the case, and now they can go back and start charging people with soaring fees because it has an overdraft.
03:56I understood. I got you.
03:58What can you do about that?
04:00Well, we're going to have to get in there and move legislation to take that back, but the banks are the ones that came to us asking for that.
04:07Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on.
04:10Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on.
04:12You're going to have to say that the real pressers are good people or it is who know something is wrong, and they think nothing about it.
04:20That's it.