Gaither Campaign for Rural America

Privatization of the VA means less accountability, less ability to do anything about problems, and less results for veterans.

Putting business in charge of veterans healthcare will result in less healthcare. In Indiana, privatization of Medicaid was a disaster for enrollees, and that was under Governor Daniels, not Mike Pence. They had to reverse course there, and we shouldn’t even consider doing this to veterans.

What we should do is the following:

• continue repairing the damage of decades of denial and decay
• have representatives show up and hold the VA accountable in hearings
• have representatives show up in their districts by listening to veterans and the groups that serve them
• increase assistance to hard hit areas like Danville and Vermilion County
• open VA sites within community health providers where VAs hospitals don’t exist
• make the pipeline bigger for people going into healthcare specialties
  • increase grants and scholarships for students
  • increase money to colleges and universities
  • increase faculty and staff that educate and train these specialties
• actually stabilize funding for Medicaid, Medicare, and local healthcare providers instead of starving them of resources.

I’m talking neurology, psychiatry, LCSWs, etc. etc. There are so many communities that have no access to too many of these specialties or have waiting lists that are excruciatingly long.

The GOP healthcare and tax plans are in exactly the opposite direction of where we should be heading as a country on all of these issues.

The GOP healthcare plan cuts healthcare for veterans, Medicaid, and Medicare. 

The GOP tax plan raises taxes on students receiving tuition waivers. 

All of this to give the wealthiest, a massive tax break. To give corporations a massive tax cut when 1 out of 5 of them don’t even pay taxes currently. Lowering the corporate tax rate will allow even more corporate welfare in order to gut more services for veterans.

This is not how you run the healthcare of those who have served and defended our country.

You Serve. You Deserve.

I will stand up to this backward thinking, campaign donor giveaways that hurt our veterans.

(Photo Courtesy of Greg Nash, The Hill)