Political Quotes

“Mr. President, late tonight, the Senate will vote on my amendment No. 5185 to the PACT Act, and as my colleague from New York was just saying, it is time that we deal with the issues of toxic exposure. As a member of the VA Committee, this is something I have worked on for the last few years. Tennessee has a large population of veterans, and we have talked a good bit about this issue and how they receive their care. One of the concerns that we had discussed in committee, in our hearings--we have discussed it with our VSOs, and we have discussed this issue as we have talked with veterans who have come to us and to our meetings--is their frustration with having access to the queue but not getting access to the care. I think we have to look at this and say: Those are very different. Now, I join our veterans in being frustrated with the fact that there is access to the queue to get on that wait list but not getting that care. So the amendment I am offering is not political. It is not controversial. It is a simple but much needed improvement to the PACT Act that will allow toxic-exposed veterans to gain access to community care to ensure they have a speedy process to care. The amendment is critical to the success of this program, and we all want the program to be successful, but what we know is that the VA is not capable of implementing the PACT Act as it is written. They have neither the infrastructure nor the personnel to do that.…”