At today's Senate Veterans Affairs Committee hearing, Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) questioned VA Secretary Doug Collins.
Category
š
NewsTranscript
00:00Thank you, Senator. Thank you. First of all, I just want to recognize the chairman. Thank you for holding this hearing. I think it is a bipartisan goal to support our veterans. And I think it's one of the first hearings I've had where, after confirmation hearing, we've brought the secretary back in short order, so I appreciate that.
00:19Secretary Collins, during your confirmation hearing, you assured me and the others here that, quote, the mission is the veteran and, quote, that you would not sacrifice the veteran. I took you at your word, as did many on this side of the dais.
00:35But since you've taken office, you've heard it. You moved to terminate VA contracts, offered to buy out VA employees that were in already shortage situations in those career fields.
00:51You placed a hiring freeze on critical VA employees serving veterans. 2,400 recent VA hires were let go, and then I think because of the courts brought back.
01:04And you've, you know, been here today doubling and tripling down on that. I have no problem with cutting fat in the VA. I worked at the Defense Department. If someone had said to me, cut fat, I'd know exactly where I'd cut.
01:16But it's the nature of the cuts. If you're firing someone on a Friday and they're being brought back on a Monday, no CEO in America would be lauded for that kind of sloppy cuts.
01:29And then when you came to Michigan, you came to Howell, Michigan, I think in the last month and a half, you were asked directly about the potential for 80,000 additional employees to be cut.
01:40And instead of pushing back, you just said, quote, there's going to be a lot of friction.
01:46And I understand that you're wordsmithing things to say that no nurses or doctors in the VA facilities are going to be touched.
01:54That is good. But I held a roundtable with veterans. These are folks who are in the business.
02:00And their concern was that if you have to, if you are a veteran and you walk into a VA, you know, an Iron Mountain, and you need to get a claim, you know, you put in a claim to get a knee surgery,
02:12and there's no claim caseworkers, there's no people working on those claims, and it takes you two years to get an answer, that's also not access to care.
02:23The doctors and nurses may be there, but if you can't go in and you're in pain every single day, that is also a problem.
02:29It's a problem for veteran center staff who have not been excluded, primary care administrators, IT staff.
02:36I know it's wonky, but you've just accelerated the electronic health record transition.
02:41I think IT staff are important if we're going to make sure we don't lose records of our veterans.
02:46And then benefit claims administrators.
02:48These are all people who kind of don't meet your criteria to be saved.
02:53We all want to serve the mission of the veterans, but what was really strange was that we had the deputy chief medical officer up here for a hearing.
03:03And we said, what's the plan on cutting, you know, this potentially 80,000?
03:08Have you been consulted? And they said very clearly, no.
03:11No. So I'm having a problem understanding how I'm to believe that the veterans in Michigan are going to get the same or better care, which is what we want,
03:22when you seem to be sort of, I don't know, you're claiming that these 80,000 are like DEI and interior designers.
03:29There's no way that all those 80,000 cover those, are in those job fields.
03:34So help me understand how you're going to preserve, you know, that veteran who needs this knee surgery, but there's no one to process his claim.
03:45Thank you, Senator. I think there's a lot to unpack there.
03:47And yes, the mission is the veteran.
03:48And I think one, I want to go back to one of the statements you made earlier.
03:51If you said DOD, you worked in DOD, you could want to find it.
03:54I would just happen to turn the table and say, if you came to work at VA, you'd probably be able to do the same thing.
03:58I don't know. I don't have a question with that.
04:00So I think that's but 80,000 is different than cutting.
04:03I mean, and and I think the the again, any CEO in America who fires people on a Friday and rehires them with back pay a week later would be fired from their job.
04:13It's sloppy and you know it.
04:15I think I'll disagree with the judge's decision there and continue the appeals process on that.
04:19So, I mean, look at it from that perspective as we go forward.
04:22But also, again, when you look at these issues and you look forward, I mean, it's interesting to me.
04:26I would just be curious and I'm just playing the scenario out.
04:30If you go into DOD, it's 20,000 a proper number, it's 50,000 proper numbers, 10,000 a proper number.
04:35At the VA, we exempted over 300,000 positions to ensure patient care, patient quality and disability benefits were being done.
04:41So how come there were people fired and then rehired from the veteran suicide hotline?
04:47Like you've you've acknowledged, I think, even publicly that some of these things were a mistake.
04:52It doesn't give us confidence that an 80,000 number, which is just a number, you didn't say career fields, you didn't say whatever, you just said 80,000, that that's being done with a scalpel and not a sledgehammer.
05:04And I think for veteran care, again, it's not me that's the only one asking these questions.
05:08It's veterans who have a very different political view than me who are getting seriously agitated back home.
05:14So I just don't understand the logic behind a cross the board haircut.
05:19Well, I think the biggest thing is, is what you're looking at here is I think right now there's been because that's what I've had to fight for the whole time is to fight this idea of just being blanket numbers throw out, playing trivia pursuit with numbers and others.
05:29It has scared veterans.
05:31So honestly, what are they going to hear?
05:32If all they hear from people is if you cut this, then it's going to actually impact my health care.
05:36Then what are they actually going to think?
05:38Because one, they've not seen a plan.
05:39Y'all not you've not seen a plan because we're still working a plan.
05:42I'm not going to play out a plan in public that would actually take employees.
05:45You wouldn't do it in your own office.
05:46And I know I'm over, but it is playing out in public because you have fired people, and then they have been rehired.
05:52That's not a secret plan.
05:53People in my district, Marines, veterans, have been fired from their VA jobs and then brought back.
05:59So it's not that there's some sneaky plan.
06:01You're in it.
06:02You're living it, and you're living the sloppiness of it.
06:05So I'm sorry I know my time's over, but I can't agree that the $80,000 is going to be a nice, trim, scalpel approach.
06:11We'll just have to be ready to disagree, Senator.
06:14Senator Banks.
06:15Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
06:16Secretary Collins, the President's budget calls for a nearly $5 billion increase for the VA.