{"id":26600,"date":"2025-02-26T14:39:42","date_gmt":"2025-02-26T19:39:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/?post_type=press-releases&p=26600"},"modified":"2025-02-26T14:39:43","modified_gmt":"2025-02-26T19:39:43","slug":"sen-ossoff-colleagues-demand-answers-on-va-firings","status":"publish","type":"press-releases","link":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/press-releases\/sen-ossoff-colleagues-demand-answers-on-va-firings\/","title":{"rendered":"Sen. Ossoff, Colleagues Demand Answers on VA Firings"},"content":{"rendered":"

Washington, D.C. <\/strong>\u2014 U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff is demanding answers after the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) fired doctors, nurses, and crisis hotline staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sen. Ossoff, Ranking Member of the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Appropriations Subcommittee, led a group of Senators pressing VA Secretary Doug Collins for answers after the Department fired doctors, nurses, and crisis hotline staff amidst the indiscriminate mass firing of recently hired VA personnel, despite the agency claiming otherwise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sen. Ossoff is joined by Senators Jack Reed (D-RI) and Gary Peters (D-MI).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cVA recently announced the firing of \u2018more than 1,000 employees\u2019 and claimed in its press release that \u2018mission-critical positions\u2019 were exempt. This claim is false. Clinicians, researchers, and Veterans Crisis Line employees were fired, apparently solely on the basis that they were recent hires,\u201d Sen. Ossoff and the group wrote.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe hope it goes without saying that clinical staff who provide medical care and employees who field calls from suicidal veterans are indeed \u2018mission-critical,\u2019\u201d Sen. Ossoff and the group continued. <\/strong>\u201cVA\u2019s indiscriminate termination of such personnel is self-defeating and risks the immediate disruption of veterans\u2019 health care and services. The potential consequences \u2014 delayed clinical appointments or neglected phone calls from veterans in crisis \u2014 could be life threatening.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As part of the inquiry, Sen. Ossoff and the group requested specific answers from Secretary Collins about the locations, positions, and veteran status of staff impacted by the Trump Administration\u2019s Hiring Freeze Executive Order and mass firings, in order to determine whether veterans in Georgia will be impacted by the actions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They further asked for data on the termination of VA researchers who were in active and ongoing clinical trials for veterans dealing with cancer, burn pit exposure, opioid addiction, and more.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sen. Ossoff continues working to help Georgia veterans access the services they earned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This month, Sen. Ossoff led<\/a> a group of Senators pressing Secretary Collins to protect veterans, their families, and VA staff from unprecedented access to sensitive information by Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (\u201cDOGE\u201d).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In January, Sen. Ossoff announced expanded benefits<\/a> for thousands of Georgia veterans, including those battling bladder cancer, ureter cancer, other genitourinary cancers, acute and chronic leukemias, and multiple myeloma thanks to the bipartisan PACT Act<\/em> he helped pass into law in 2022.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sen. Ossoff also launched an inquiry<\/a> with the U.S. Postmaster General after receiving reports from Georgia veterans that they are receiving prescriptions late and appointment notices after their scheduled appointments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Click here<\/a> to read the Senators\u2019 letter to VA Secretary Collins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

# # #<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Washington, D.C. \u2014 U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff is demanding answers after the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) fired doctors, nurses, and crisis hotline staff. Sen. Ossoff, Ranking Member of the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Appropriations Subcommittee, led a group of Senators pressing VA Secretary Doug Collins for answers after the Department fired doctors, nurses, and crisis […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26600","press-releases","type-press-releases","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press_releases\/26600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press_releases"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/press-releases"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/70"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press_releases\/26600\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26602,"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press_releases\/26600\/revisions\/26602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ossoff.senate.gov\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}