In his first six weeks on the job, US Division of Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins has combed by lower than 2% of the company’s contracts — and is already shocked by the bloat he’s discovered, he informed The Publish this week.
“The VA was paying for PowerPoint slides and assembly notes, for the watering of crops, and consulting contracts to do the work that we must be doing ourselves,” he informed The Publish this week.
To not point out DEI coaching, prosthetic personal components, gender affirming hair elimination and gender affirming voice coaching.
However that spend-happy period is over — and he’s not making any apologies for it.
“I’m not going to permit the VA to be the whipping publish anymore. We’re really going to unravel issues and maintain doing our job, so for anyone on the Hill or in unions who needs to complain,” he mentioned, firing again at critics throughout the aisle decrying cuts.
“We’ve bought to be sure that we’re doing what is remitted by us and that’s to handle veterans, it doesn’t matter what,” he mentioned. “They’re all nonetheless going to have their advantages and healthcare. However we’ve bought to recollect we’re not an employment company, we’re a service group.”
Collins has up to now canceled a whole lot of non-mission crucial contracts to web $900 million in financial savings, after which saved one other $14 million by ditching DEI staff and contracts.
On Monday, he ended remedy for gender dysphoria to reallocate funds to deal with severely injured veterans and amputees. The company beforehand coated hormone remedy, prosthetic genitals and breasts, hair elimination, voice coaching, and different so-called “gender-affirming care,” based on inner company paperwork seen by The Publish.
Transgender individuals make up solely about “one-tenth of 1 %” of the 9.1 million veterans enrolled in VA healthcare, based on the company.
Doubtless the largest financial savings will come from reductions in drive — the division already axed 2,400 staff, and a leaked memo from the Elon Musk led Division of Authorities Effectivity earlier this month advisable firing 80,000 extra.
If carried out, that variety of terminations would return the VA to its 2019 staffing ranges.
Throughout former President Biden’s time period, the entire variety of VA full time workers grew by greater than 52,000 staff, mentioned a VA spokesperson. That accounts for two-thirds of the division’s expanded workforce set to be slashed.
“The earlier administration added tens of hundreds of staff, and albeit we’re unsure what they had been employed for as a result of we’re not seeing the profit,” Collins informed The Publish.
Biden tacked on a staggering $89 billion to the VA’s finances throughout his time period, however Collins mentioned the final administration had nothing to point out for it.
An 2024 Workplace of Inspector Basic documented a whole lot of tens of millions of {dollars} in improper funds and questioned prices below Biden, together with $325.5 million in unauthorized dental procedures and $200 million in prescription prices missing justification.
In the meantime, common VA wait instances for major care, psychological well being care, and specialty care all rose considerably between 2021 and 2024, based on a VA spokesperson. The division’s incapacity advantages claims backlog reached its highest stage since 2013 final yr.
Veteran suicide didn’t enhance both. The VA spent $571 million on suicide prevention outreach final yr — up from $4.4 million in 2008 — but the end result grimly stays the identical, with about 6,500 veterans per yr taking their very own lives.
“They felt like cash and other people had been the answer, however we’ve come to seek out out actual rapidly that the issue on the VA is that we should be higher stewards of the sources we’ve been given,” Collins mentioned.
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