On the recordMarch 4, 2025
Mr. President, we made a sacred promise to our veterans that after their service, they would get the care and support that they earned. That promise did not come with an expiration date. And as a combat veteran myself, I take this responsibility personally on behalf of Arizona's more than 500,000 veterans and veterans across the country. But with these mass firings of staff at the VA, President Trump and Elon Musk are breaking that promise. In the last month, thousands of VA employees, people who care for our Nation's veterans, were fired with no warning, no phone call, no meeting--just an email telling them that they no longer had a job, that they were no longer wanted. These aren't just nameless, faceless bureaucrats; these are Americans who signed up to serve our country by taking care of veterans. They deserve to be treated with respect. These are the people on the frontlines of veterans' care and services, and they were fired without even a thought. We can all agree that the VA can do a better job, but aimlessly firing thousands of people will do nothing to help speed up veterans' healthcare--nothing. It will just make accessing care more difficult. Secretary Collins and the VA claim that these were ``non-mission critical'' jobs. Well, that is simply not true.…





