Press Releases

Today, House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs Chairman Mike Bost (R-Ill.), delivered the following opening remarks, as prepared, at the start of the Committee’s oversight hearing on the Biden-Harris administration’s mismanagement of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) budget and purported fiscal year (FY) 2024 benefits budget shortfall and FY 2025 health care budget shortfall:

Good morning.

The Committee will come to order.

I want to welcome Under Secretary Jacobs and Under Secretary Elnahal back to discuss the V.A. budget.

Over the last six months, we have not been able to get a straight answer from anybody at V.A. about how much money they have, and how much money they are spending.

The numbers keep changing.

But V.A.’s leaders haven’t been shy about asking for billions of extra taxpayer dollars.

However, when we dig into how they came up with those numbers, we get the runaround, as if they answer to no one.

All the estimates are wrong.

Basic figures about how much they have already spent are wrong too.

And large parts of V.A.’s budget requests seem to be made up.

If you ran a small business this way, you would soon be out of business.

Managing a 370 billion dollar budget this way is inexcusable.

This accounting disaster is insulting to every veteran and taxpayer.

In September, Congress appropriated 2.88 billion dollars because Mr. Jacobs told Congress, the veteran community, and the public that if he was short by even one dollar to pay disability compensation and education benefits on September 20th, every veteran’s benefits could be delayed.

He told us there was no way to know before September 20th whether that would happen, and the risk was simply too great.

Mr. Jacobs, I took you at your word.

I supported the supplemental appropriation.

Then in October, after repeatedly sending letters pressing for answers, we found out that no benefits shortfall ever existed.

V.A. didn’t spend any of the 2.88 billion before the end of the fiscal year.

I understand being conservative and ensuring the funding would be in place.

However, there is a big difference between being off by even one dollar versus several billion.

Now V.A. is putting out statements claiming that no one had any idea until weeks after September 20th that there was more than enough money to pay all the benefits.

I don’t believe that.

Somewhere along the way, someone decided to keep telling the same story about the shortfall even though the numbers didn’t support it.

This Committee is going to find out who decided that.

Dr. Elnahal, the situation with your health care budget seems very similar.

In July, you told us your budget was so tight, you had to spend every single dollar to make it to the end of the fiscal year to keep delivering healthcare.

You told us community care, payroll, equipment, drug, and prosthetics costs were all exploding at once.

You told us you were headed for a 12-billion-dollar shortfall in fiscal year 2025, which started on October 1st.

The White House requested the 12 billion dollars immediately and said veterans’ health care could be denied or delayed.

I asked Secretary McDonough to take another look at the books before making statements like that.

It turns out the health care budget wasn’t any tighter in 2024 than any other fiscal year, and V.H.A. carried over more than 12 billion dollars of unspent taxpayer money into 2025.

It turns out community care and payroll costs didn’t rise any faster than normal.

Now we are being told the health care shortfall is 6.6 billion, not 12.

But the explanations are the same, and they still don’t add up.

So, this Committee is going to try once again to get answers.

Congress has always found ways to prioritize V.A.

As I said at the beginning of the Congress, we have always funded our veterans’ health care and benefits, and I’m confident we always will.

In order to do that, we need to get the truth from V.A. from the first jump, not more spin and pressure tactics.

Mr. Jacobs and Dr. Elnahal, in Chicago, they have an expression for when an underling takes the blame for the boss.

It’s called wearing the jacket.

I suspect you may be wearing the jacket here.

The budget request gets decided in the White House, and I suspect these confusing stories about V.A.’s budget shortfalls were cooked up in the White House too.

Weaponizing the V.A. budget should be off limits.

Scaring veterans and their families for political gain should be off limits too.

You should all hold yourselves to a higher standard on behalf of the men and women who have served.

When I joined this Committee 10 years ago, handling the V.A. budget like this was unthinkable.

I hope we can get back to operating the right way in the next Congress.