FBI Delay Stalls Confirmation Of VA Secretary-Nominee Doug Collins
Citing a delay in FBI completing customary background checks, Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee leadership chose to delay Doug Collins’ confirmation hearing.
Collins was nominated by President-elect Donald Trump to head the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), an agency historically plagued with corruption and nepotism. The agency is presently led by non-veteran Denis McDonough whose leadership advanced more liberal leaning priorities leading to funding shortfalls like the rest of the federal government.
McDonough reportedly accomplished a lot during his administration including implementation of the PACT Act, advancement of certain Veteran Readiness & Employment benefits. Some have been critical of McDonough, though for using agency resources to advance medical scheduling services for illegal immigrants, setting up voting resources in certain locations, providing abortions to pregnant veterans for the first time, and failing to anticipate funding shortfalls.
RELATED: VA Set To Make Abortion Policy Official
Failing to timely confirm a new VA Secretary may seem harmless to some.
Once a new president is sworn in, the existing Senate-confirmed appointees will resign leaving agency bureaucrats in charge until someone is sworn in. This is fine if you trust the existing bench of leadership within an agency, but something tells me VA will get a lot of immediate attention from reformers looking to cut fat from the agency’s budget.
Delays, even at VA, may cost taxpayers a lot of money and veterans their lives if the agency does not provide prompt access to appropriate medical services. As a veteran rights attorney, we’ve seen the impact of bad policies and bad leadership for over a decade.
There are no muligans when a veteran dies at the hands of an incompetent doctor or nurse.
That said, it is important our system of checks and balances works efficiently and effectively. We want the best people in charge at VA, and we have no reason to believe Collins will fail our veterans – – and he certainly should not be worse than certain secretaries in the past who I will not name here.
Senate Republicans On Doug Collins’ Delay
“Congressman Doug Collins has submitted all his paperwork in a timely manner and has been transparent and forthcoming with the committee,” said Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., the committee chairman. “At this time, the FBI has not completed its customary background check of Congressman Collins. In accordance with long-standing practice, the committee should have an opportunity to review Congressman Collins’ FBI file before the confirmation hearing.”
Sen. Moran’s position seems to match the position of the Senate Democrats.
Last week, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, demanded that all proper security checks must be completed before nominees will be confirmed.
“These nominees will have enormous power,” Schumer said. “Every American has to go through some background check and be asked questions when they’re applying for a job. These jobs are so important, so of course that should happen here.”
The FBI paperwork delay is apparently holding up the confirmation hearing process of other President-elect Donald Trump’s nominees. Trump is pushing the Senate to conduct the hearings speedily to avoid delays when he takes office next week.
Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn, said he was unsure about why the FBI was delayed, and he confirmed the Collins nomination is “less controversial” than some other picks for Trump’s cabinet. However, Democrat support of Collins will depend on his answers at the hearing.
It is anticipated Collins will be confirmed, but some lawmakers are concerned how he will address difficult questions on the agency’s budget shortfalls and abortion.
The hearing should proceed shortly once the documents are provided, assuming nothing else is afoot.
“I expect the FBI to complete its review quickly so that the committee can move forward with its role of evaluating the president’s nominee,” Mr. Moran said.
Historically, nominees for leading positions within VA are not controversial, though the confirmation process may result in delays for a variety of reasons. It is hopefully not wishful thinking to believe the FBI will show up with the documents needed to allow the Senate to complete their review.
Off-Gas
Confirmation delays can be challenging, and this looks to be acutely true for this second Trump Administration. Presently, the FBI delay appears to be impacting all nominees, not just Doug Collins.
Various news outlets have reported President-elect Trump is alarmed by reports that Senate Democrats are planning, for nefarious purposes, to delay his nominees. He was so concerned about this that he made the Senate Majority Leader John Thune promise to allow recess appointments.
Again, hopefully, these concerns are unfounded or do not otherwise materialize, and we get on with the business of moving the country forward in a successful direction.
What do you think? Is this administration on the right track with pushing forward the nomination process before President Trump is sworn in?
In the next administration, what do you hope VA addresses or fixes first?
Did you know that they’ve been denying care for people with service connected musculoskeletal conditions for the better part of a decade? For many, no surgery (for cervical disk herniations, which is dangerous) and no pain medication. Gabapentin isn’t appropriate pain medication for that condition by the way. They force people to waste away in pain for 10, 15, 20 years before they finally do the surgery. That’s instead of just going ahead and getting it done. These VA secretaries only exist to perpetuate the system and shield people from the fraud and embarrassment that this system might bring the president and the country. That’s all they’re there for. The federal judiciary is responsible for every bit of the fraud in that system because they’re derelict.
One reason why the VA likes to hire veterans is because veterans have a tendency to not be critical of systems or bite the hand that feeds them… and their is no complaint line in the military either. You got a problem with the system? When all is said and done you can go to hell. I can’t think of a better employee than that for a substandard and dysfunctional system where denial of care is common place. That and you get a situation where the VA just might get lucky enough to have a veterans word again another veterans word and whose word are they gonna take in that situation? The veteran who works for the system… not the patient. Just one of the thousands of reasons why the VA is a bad healthcare model.
If you’ve been going to VA mental health for a period of over one year, they’re looking at you like you got a personality disorder. That’s the VA’s biggest secret because they know people will flee like rats off a sinking ship once people figure that out. That’s just the sort of bad philosophy that’s coming out of academia these days so you can’t completely blame the VA. That’s just one reason why many in mental health at the VA are disgruntled. They want to be able to openly wield their pseudo intellectual garbage on anyone and everyone. They don’t see that as dehumanization. It’s completely justified and rationalized by their bogus philosophy and too many people have accepted it as legitimate.
The VA will never be superior to the private sector, not only because of the fact that it’s a bad healthcare model and poop fly magnet, but especially because of things such as immunity and unlimited legal resources, along with protections for “federal workers.” So these people become super citizens the minute they crawl out of a drain pipe and get a job at VA. They can be insubordinate, abusive, and deny care all day long without reprocussions. They are fully aware of that as well so… this are just some of the reasons why the place is a threat to rights, health, and human safety. It’s a risk to mess around in there. If you completely depend on them for healthcare, you will be sorry guaranteed.
The sky is blue, water is wet, fire is hot, and people have to get their Fourth Amendment rights trampled on to obtain unelected office. What else is new. Old Doug will not be able to fix the broken joke because the dysfunctionality is hidden from the top dog and it’s just such a shit show in general that it would have to be turned into an insurance program to be fixed. Right now, no reprocussions for denial of care and abuse so it will continue. It’s the cheapest solution too and these rotten assholes at VA give a sob story about how good it is as a jobs program and how much better it is than private care which is the biggest lie I’ve ever heard.
Fix the leadership at the top: stop running the VA HEALTHCARE SYSTEM as an HMO that denies care. DELAY,DENY,DEPRIVE is the current state. As I see it, nothing has changed and they actually made it worse with the 3 card Monty Appeal System.
To finally include Panama and Okinawa for coverage under the PACT ACT. The very same herbicides 2,4-D & 2,4,5-T were shipped to both Panama and Vietnam from 1959-1977 according to Census of U.S. Exports Table B. It took 60 years to get Thailand and Guam covered. Enough is enough.
Kash Patel should the ARMY!
He is of no Substance.
VA Mental Health prescribes Antidepressants that induce Suicides and Homicides to ‘prevent’ Veteran Suicides, why not kill innocent babies at the VA too.
Ref: 110th Congressional Hearing
“THE TRUTH ABOUT VETERANS’ SUICIDES”
21 Apr 2008
Your subservience to the new fascist government is showing as is your right wing bias. The VA does not need a right wing white christian nationalist sky pilot to lead it in prayer for the orange gawd. If, big if now, the FBI does it’s job we will find that the sky pilot is not fit to lead our VA.
The VA has improved since my first encounter back in the 1990’s but there is still a long way to go especially in how overseas Veterans are treated, hint like 2nd rate citizens. This sky pilot isn’t the one to do the job. His main attribute is fealty and loyalty to the coming fascist wanna’ be dictator.
The first thing I hope they fix is the Cerner update debacle that has been going on for years.
He’s not gonna fix a damn thing because the fake and fraudulent system can’t be fixed. I became convinced years ago (I left many years ago) that they were simply pretending to be doing healthcare in there. Keep in mind that a monkey could hand out pills and communicate with people. There’s more to healthcare than that… and they even fuck that up.
I hope Kash Patel disbands FBI. The FBI has been turned into a political police and all their investigations are biased. The public deserves better than dealing with secret police with hidden puppet masters controlling their agenda.
Just look at the workforce at VA and that will give you a good idea of what you can find at the FBI. People who won’t hesitate to violate your rights and treat people like shit because they have unlimited legal resources and immunity. Only when the federal judiciary decides to play their part in our democracy will this change. These twisted and entitled agencies will not get straight on their own. They’re gonna have to be sorted out from other branches of government. That has yet to happen. Government in the USA is a country club and if you don’t belong to it then nothing you say matters. Trump didn’t change that. Federal courts must do all the work and they aren’t doing shit.
As someone that uses Veteran’s Administration services, I certainly hope any delays, to confirm the next Secretary are not too long and drawn out and definitely not for political reasons because some may not like the appointment. The FBI, itself, is not without controversy. But
I think it’s entirely appropriate to vet any appointee ahead of time or as soon as possible. especially this nominee.