Following through on a campaign promise, President Donald Trump on Friday morning signed legislation aimed at reforming the famously dysfunctional Department of Veterans Affairs.
The Department of Veterans Affairs Accountability and Whistleblower Protection Act, which Congress passed earlier this month, removes some of the delays and red tape that make it difficult for VA supervisors to fire underperforming employees.
It also creates a new office within the VA to advise the secretary “on all matters of the Department relating to accountability, including accountability of employees of the Department, retaliation against whistleblowers, and such matters as the Secretary considers similar and affect public trust in the Department.”
The VA has been attempting reforms since 2014, when dysfunction at VA hospitals resulted in several veterans dying while awaiting care. During his presidential campaign, Trump frequently criticized the VA, calling it the “most incompetently run agency in the United States.”
“In their courage, their dignity, and their selfless sacrifice, [veterans] represent the very best of us. Our veterans have fulfilled their duty to this nation and now, we must fulfill our duty to them,” Trump said.
Trump also said that the accountability bill was not the last word in reforming the VA and promised to continue to implement changes “until the job is done.”
Speaking at the Christian Science Monitor breakfast on Tuesday, VA secretary David Shulkin said he supported the bill, which he insisted would not lead to mass firings at the government’s second-largest department and would, in fact, raise morale.
“There is nothing more demoralizing than working alongside people that everybody knows no longer share the values, the morals, the values and the ethics of the vast majority of the people who go to work every day,” Shulkin said.
When the legislation was first introduced in March, the American Federation of Government Employees slammed it as a “union-busting bill.”
“Once again, some lawmakers have completely ignored the evidence that the VA provides veterans the best—and only—integrated health system tailored entirely to their needs,” said AFGE president J. David Cox, Jr., in a statement.
