‘Unite for Vets’ rally calls for Trump to abandon planned cuts at VA
MilitaryTimes.com reports:
“Thousands of veterans converged on the National Mall on Friday to rally against proposed cuts to Veterans Affairs staffing, moves that advocates insist will endanger their health and lives.
The “Unite for Veterans, Unite for America Rally” — which featured a performance from the rock band Dropkick Murphys — was one of 200 events scheduled across the country Friday in an effort to mobilize the veterans community.
The event was billed as nonpartisan, but the Washington gathering featured numerous signs and protests against President Donald Trump, VA Secretary Doug Collins and billionaire Elon Musk, accusing them of betraying the country’s promises to troops.
“Are you tired of being thanked for our service in the public and stabbed in our back in private?” Army veteran Everett Kelly, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees, asked the crowd assembled just a few blocks from the White House.
“For years, politicians on both sides of the aisle have campaigned on their support of veterans, but once they get into office, they cut our benefits, our services. They take every opportunity to privatize our health care.”
The event — coinciding with the 81st anniversary of D-Day — was modeled on the Bonus Army protests of the 1930s, when veterans who served in World War I gathered in Washington to demand extra pay they had been denied after leaving the service.
Organizers said this public protest needed to highlight worrisome plans from Trump and Collins to cut roughly 80,000 VA staffers in the coming months and shift more money from the federal health care system to private-sector clinics.
VA officials in a statement dismissed the concerns and the event as misguided.
“Anyone who says VA is cutting health care and benefits is not being honest,” said VA press secretary Peter Kasperowicz in a statement.
“The Biden Administration failed to address nearly all of VA’s most serious problems, including rising health care wait times, benefits backlogs, and major issues with survivor benefits. Under President Trump and Secretary Collins, VA is fixing these problems and making major improvements.”
Department leaders have sparred with Democratic lawmakers in recent months over details of those plans, and over the assertion that VA is a fundamentally broken organization in need of major reforms.
Irma Westmoreland, a registered nurse working at a VA hospital and the secretary-treasurer of National Nurses United, said workers are already dealing with new restrictions and issues of short-staffing, with fears that more are on the way.
“It’s important for every person to keep their job, from the engineering staff to the housekeeper to the dietary staff,” she told the crowd, eliciting applause. “When cuts are made, the nursing and medical staff will have to pick up all their work that needs to be done.”
Organizers encouraged veterans at Friday’s rally to take their protests back home, through local activism and awareness campaigns, to ensure veterans services remain unharmed.
For their part, VA officials dismissed the event as little more than union complaints and pledged to press ahead with their reform proposals in the coming months.”
[i]My commentary[/i]:
The trifecta of TACO, Muskrat, and Doug Collins are attempting to de grade the Department of Veterans Affairs to the point of outright failure by their ineffective leadership completely devoid of any concern or commitment to the needs of veterans.
Collins is nothing but an unqualified liar and cheerleader for a convicted felon who referred to deceased soldiers as “suckers” and “losers” and falsified his medical records to dodge the draft out of personal cowardice.
Kasperowicz is just another inept, lying fool making completely unwarranted cowardly accusations against President Biden and his administration which made major improvements to the VA adding much needed support for homelessness, addiction, suicide prevention, and PTSD as well as decreasing waiting times, expanding specialty care, and streamlining benefits. And then there is the PACT ACT which addressed a long overlooked serious spectrum of serious health care needs.
We veterans KNOW which administration took care of us and which misadministration is privately working to destroy our VA while publicly lying about it!
And, no, most vets and active duty do NOT support the Apricot Antichrist and never will!
“Thousands of veterans converged on the National Mall on Friday to rally against proposed cuts to Veterans Affairs staffing, moves that advocates insist will endanger their health and lives.
The “Unite for Veterans, Unite for America Rally” — which featured a performance from the rock band Dropkick Murphys — was one of 200 events scheduled across the country Friday in an effort to mobilize the veterans community.
The event was billed as nonpartisan, but the Washington gathering featured numerous signs and protests against President Donald Trump, VA Secretary Doug Collins and billionaire Elon Musk, accusing them of betraying the country’s promises to troops.
“Are you tired of being thanked for our service in the public and stabbed in our back in private?” Army veteran Everett Kelly, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees, asked the crowd assembled just a few blocks from the White House.
“For years, politicians on both sides of the aisle have campaigned on their support of veterans, but once they get into office, they cut our benefits, our services. They take every opportunity to privatize our health care.”
The event — coinciding with the 81st anniversary of D-Day — was modeled on the Bonus Army protests of the 1930s, when veterans who served in World War I gathered in Washington to demand extra pay they had been denied after leaving the service.
Organizers said this public protest needed to highlight worrisome plans from Trump and Collins to cut roughly 80,000 VA staffers in the coming months and shift more money from the federal health care system to private-sector clinics.
VA officials in a statement dismissed the concerns and the event as misguided.
“Anyone who says VA is cutting health care and benefits is not being honest,” said VA press secretary Peter Kasperowicz in a statement.
“The Biden Administration failed to address nearly all of VA’s most serious problems, including rising health care wait times, benefits backlogs, and major issues with survivor benefits. Under President Trump and Secretary Collins, VA is fixing these problems and making major improvements.”
Department leaders have sparred with Democratic lawmakers in recent months over details of those plans, and over the assertion that VA is a fundamentally broken organization in need of major reforms.
Irma Westmoreland, a registered nurse working at a VA hospital and the secretary-treasurer of National Nurses United, said workers are already dealing with new restrictions and issues of short-staffing, with fears that more are on the way.
“It’s important for every person to keep their job, from the engineering staff to the housekeeper to the dietary staff,” she told the crowd, eliciting applause. “When cuts are made, the nursing and medical staff will have to pick up all their work that needs to be done.”
Organizers encouraged veterans at Friday’s rally to take their protests back home, through local activism and awareness campaigns, to ensure veterans services remain unharmed.
For their part, VA officials dismissed the event as little more than union complaints and pledged to press ahead with their reform proposals in the coming months.”
[i]My commentary[/i]:
The trifecta of TACO, Muskrat, and Doug Collins are attempting to de grade the Department of Veterans Affairs to the point of outright failure by their ineffective leadership completely devoid of any concern or commitment to the needs of veterans.
Collins is nothing but an unqualified liar and cheerleader for a convicted felon who referred to deceased soldiers as “suckers” and “losers” and falsified his medical records to dodge the draft out of personal cowardice.
Kasperowicz is just another inept, lying fool making completely unwarranted cowardly accusations against President Biden and his administration which made major improvements to the VA adding much needed support for homelessness, addiction, suicide prevention, and PTSD as well as decreasing waiting times, expanding specialty care, and streamlining benefits. And then there is the PACT ACT which addressed a long overlooked serious spectrum of serious health care needs.
We veterans KNOW which administration took care of us and which misadministration is privately working to destroy our VA while publicly lying about it!
And, no, most vets and active duty do NOT support the Apricot Antichrist and never will!
