Jon Tester

Well, I'm going to see President Trump this afternoon at the VA, and I'm going to take this issue up with him because I think that hopefully he will understand how critically important it is.

Has the hiring freeze been lifted for the VA or not?

I think we really need to focus on trying to figure out if we can get a non-opioid pain killer out there.

The VA overprescribed me, and my son committed suicide.

The VA will not give me the pain killers I need to deal with my back problems.

I fully support, as I believe the rest of my members here with me today, support the parity of benefits for our members when they are deployed with our active duty counterparts.

I believe, and I think most people believe that active duty deployment should count the same when it comes to benefits no matter what.

It is critically important, I believe, for the country.

I want to thank you all for your service and equally as important, the people you represent.

I guarantee you we are going to hold the Veterans Affairs Administration accountable.

We have been at this for a long, long time. One billion would buy multiple counties in the State of Montana. It is a lot of money.

It is not true interoperability. It is not where we need to be, let's just put it that way.

I will tell you, as I am about to hold you accountable, we are going to be holding the VA very accountable on this issue.

I want to talk to you, Ms. Cummings, a little bit about electronic medical records.

Issues like suicide prevention and mental care need to be monitored and coordinated at the highest level and across the services.

Some folks equate American military interventions with American leadership. For the record, I do not.

We should certainly not take away food from our seniors who are hungry to pay for increased military activity across the globe.

The President's budget, however, goes about it in what I believe is the wrong way.

We are missing out on information that we need to have to make good decisions. If you do not have good information, you do not make good decisions.

But, right now, the Administration is asking for a reprogramming of $20 million--not to look at technology, not to look at drones, and not to look at anything other than a concrete wall.

When, in fact, they will go to the weakest link.

I have made plenty of mistakes, and you need to admit them and move on, or you never get it fixed.

If we hire 5,000 new agents, we must at least put 1,500 of those agents on the Northern border.

Mike Missal, we spent a long time getting you confirmed as IG, which is bad on us, by the way.

I would hope that the VA treats you with the highest respect and integrity, because I believe you are a man of those qualities.