A Community Conversation
4/9/25
I spoke at a Community Conversation in Livingston, MT, on April 5 as part of the nationwide mass mobilization against Trump and his agenda. The goal of that event was to make highly politicized issues personal. My topic was cuts to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and services to veterans, and I began by being personal.
I enlisted in the Army in 1967, during the big buildup of U.S. forces in Vietnam. I didn’t enlist to fight communism. I was an unhappy, naive teenager who wanted to get away from troubles at home. I wasn’t sent to Vietnam. I spent two years in Germany in a NATO unit working with German soldiers. When I returned home, I realized just how lucky I was. Two of my high school buddies had died in Nam. Two more that survived committed suicide once they returned home.
It took me a while to readjust, but I eventually went to college on the GI Bill. I earned a degree that led me to a long career helping injured workers deal with life-changing issues. I used a VA-backed loan to buy a home. As the years went on, I thought less and less about my military service. Until I agreed to speak today.
As I spent hours researching VA services, I thought again about my buddies and all the other vets who served in WW11, Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, Iraq, Afghanistan, and what are now called Post 9/11 Conflicts.
Montana’s home to lots of vets. There are 85,000 across the state and 1500 here in Park County. In fact, Montana has the third-highest veterans population per capita in the country.
How many other vets are here today? Please raise your hand. Let’s hear a round of applause for them.
The VA manages a $350 billion-plus budget nationwide and operates the largest integrated healthcare system in the country. ]Montana has 16 community-based clinics, a community living center, and an acute-care medical center. Our closest clinic is the Travis W. Atkins Clinic in Bozeman.
The VA Secretary, Doug Collins, has repeatedly said he will cut more than 80,000 jobs and take the VA staffing back to what it was in 2019.
Let’s examine how the demand for and provision of veteran services has changed over the last six years.
Overall, since 2019, the number of veterans eligible for services has grown with “more veterans aging into the system and requiring specialized treatment for combat-related injuries, PTSD, and toxic exposure illnesses.”
In 2021, more than half (52%) of veterans relied on at least one VA benefit or service, and more than 6 million used VA healthcare.
In 2022, the PACT Act (Honoring our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics) was passed with bipartisan support. Senators Tester and Daines both voted for the final version. However, passing that law required pressure from the many veterans who camped out at the US capital building for days. The PACT Act led to a huge expansion of benefits and services to millions of veterans who were exposed to radiation and hazardous chemicals during their service.
Since the passing of the PACT Act, nearly 740,000 new veterans have enrolled in VA benefits, including more than 300,000 veterans of Vietnam, the Gulf War, and the Post-9/11 conflicts.
In 2023, to handle all these new vets, the VA hired nearly 62,000 new employees. That included about 12,000 new nurses, as well hundreds of new psychiatrists, a category of doctors that government watchdogs said the VA had a "severe shortage" of.
In 2023, the VA set a record for care and benefits to veterans.
Finally, in 2024, the VA set a new record with more than 9 million veterans receiving physical and mental health care.
Now, keep in mind that the VA doesn’t serve only veterans who were injured in combat. Although that alone is a big job: more than one-third of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans have been diagnosed with PTSD, and that number is considered low because it only accounts for veterans who seek VA assistance.
The VA’s mission, as enshrined in 2023, is, and I quote, "to fulfill President Lincoln's promise to care for those who have served in our nation's military and for their families, caregivers, and survivors.”
The VA reports that they serve more than 50,000 caregivers, more than 600,000 Veteran survivors (that includes spouses, children, or parents), and millions of veterans who did not serve in combat.
To veterans, the VA provides many services, including healthcare, long-term care, education, disability compensation, home loans, vocational rehabilitation, and burial benefits.
Caregivers receive services such as skills training, one-on-one coaching, group support, telephone support, online programs, self-care, and referrals to VA and community resources.
The VA also has a significant research arm that is essential in finding ways to treat exposure to toxic chemicals and other modern war injuries.
The VA provides these services while suffering staffing shortages, including in clinical positions. That’s according to a report in February from the vice chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee. To address these shortages, Congress provided expanded hiring authorities and increased pay and bonus schedules for certain VA employees.
Yet VA Secretary Collins has repeatedly said he will cut more than 80,000 jobs and take the VA staffing back to 2019. Despite the tremendous increase in demand for services since then, the millions of veterans that used their benefits, the 3/4 of a million using the new PACT benefits, the staggering number of veterans getting help with PTSD, and the increased demand for services to caregivers and veteran survivors.
The VA will complete an internal review on May 9 and publish its reorganization plan in June. Layoffs would begin in August.
So, what will these cuts mean to Montana and Park County veterans?
The Senate Appropriations Committee stated that firing VA employees will, at the very least, force veterans to wait longer:
To see health care providers;
To have their disability claims adjudicated;
To have someone pick up their calls at the Veterans Crisis Line;
To have burial and funeral expense reimbursement;
The potential firing of long-time VA researchers also puts clinical trials that veterans are enrolled in at risk and jeopardizes research that could yield critical breakthroughs. This includes research examining treatment options for PTSD, opioid addiction, and cancer caused by veterans’ exposure to toxic chemicals. By the way, more than 50,000 Montana veterans were likely exposed to toxic substances during their service.
According to the national legislative director for the nonpartisan group Disabled American Veterans, which has studied how cuts might affect care, there's a long-term effect as well.
And I quote: “You could lose trust among the veteran population over some of these things that have happened and the way that they’ve happened. And we do fear damage to the recruitment and retention of hiring the best and brightest to serve veterans.”
Time will tell how many VA jobs will be cut, how many services decreased, how much research lost.
But after researching and writing about this issue, I have no doubt that Montana, with its large veteran population, including veterans in Park County, will feel the effects of cuts.
Yours in Resistance,
Rick