PRESCRIPTION FOR CARING FOR AMERICA'S VETERANS

BY BEN CARSON

Ensuring that the VA becomes what the nation demands and our veterans deserve

The recent and ongoing failures of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) are a national disgrace. After bearing the burden of defending our nation, too many veterans have returned home to find that the department charged with caring for their wounds (both seen and unseen), compensating them for their injuries and helping them to transition back into society is a morass of incompetence, red tape and indifference. Soaring rates of suicide, unemployment and homelessness; long wait times resulting in the death of some veterans; a lack of accountability and an attitude among some within the VA that they are entitled to their jobs regardless of poor performance; have become the hallmarks of a dysfunctional bureaucracy. While many committed leaders and servants toil at the VA, its performance is marred by incompetence and corruption bred by structural impediments and bureaucratic inertia.

Years of effort and billions of dollars have been thrown at “fixing” the VA, and the results have been abysmal. There continues to be a frustrating backlog of veterans waiting for treatment or disability classification that drives them and their families to despair. Millions of dollars have been spent in an attempt to integrate medical records, making even rudimentary continuity of care from the Department of Defense (DOD) to the VA difficult and expensive. Instead of making the military-to-civilian transition more seamless, the VA has made it more complicated.

"While many committed leaders and servants toil at the VA, its performance is marred by incompetence and corruption bred by structural impediments and bureaucratic inertia."

These and other failures have led to numerous calls for VA reform. But most ideas on the subject tinker on the margins and miss three unavoidable realities:

1. The VA is an enormous bureaucracy with multiple functions beyond health care that work well;
2. The VA health and benefits systems represent an enormous investment in facilities, infrastructure and people; and most importantly, 

3.any change to how the VA works will require bipartisan legislation.

The VA’s fundamental problems are twofold. 

First, the Secretary of the VA does not have the authority he needs to manage the organization. Second, the culture at the VA needs to change. 

As an initial priority, a Carson administration will drive change in both of those areas. Then and only then will the fixes for each individual issue be successful.

As president, I will be committed to ensuring that the VA becomes what the nation demands and our veterans deserve: a functional institution that serves the needs of individuals who sacrificed to ensure the freedom, peace and prosperity of our great country.

THANK YOU

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