Vet Groups Counter GOP Health Care Hit

Republican congressmen appear to be rushing to the barricades to defend veterans from the health care legislation they say threatens the medical benefits vets and their families have earned through service.

Wielding a July 30 letter from some influential vet groups to House leadership, several top Republicans are battering Democrat-lead health care reform, claiming veterans are afraid they'll lose their VA-backed care.

In a statement, top Republican on the House Committee on Veterans Affairs Rep. Steve Buyer (Ind.) said "the Democrats' national health care form bill is an affront to our solemn obligation to maintain the integrity and independence of our military and veterans' health care systems," using the purported letter to buttress his claims.

And South Carolina Republican Rep. Henry E. Brown, the ranking Republican on the committee's health panel, said he shares the veterans groups' concerns "that this monstrous government takeover of health care" could hurt them and their families.

Problem is, the July 30 letter was never intended as an attack on health care reform, the authors say.

"Absolutely not," said Rick Weidman, director of government relations for Vietnam Veterans of America, who signed the letter on behalf of VVA. The intent of the letter, he said, was to secure protections in the legislation for veterans, not to challenge health care reform in general.

"We will probably put out some kind of clarification," he told Military.com on Aug. 4. "We're starting to get some blowback, and we see people misinterpreting what we signed onto, which we were afraid of in the first place, but we needed to say it."

Some of those who signed the letter include the Disabled American Veterans, AMVETS, the Military Order of the Purple Heart of the USA, the Blinded Veterans Association, the Jewish War Veterans of the USA, and the VVA.

"I thought the press release was very specific," said Brian Lawrence, spokesman for Republicans on the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs. He said Buyer's characterization of the legislation was his own.

"He was not speaking for the VSOs," Lawrence said. "The sentence was deliberately worded for that reason."

Brown spokeswoman Sharon P. Axson said the congressman also stands by his July 31 statement.

"He shares the concerns of those groups," Axson said of Brown. But she said the reference to a "monstrous government takeover of health care" was not intended to suggest the organizations view the legislation that way.

The groups had three specific things they wanted included in any bill, according to Joseph A. Violante, national legislative director for DAV.

Two of the three were addressed through amendments to the legislation on July 31, he said, including ensuring that vets using VA health care can still enroll in any public or private insurance alternative in order to cover their dependents, and to ensure that VA health care will continue to be overseen by the VA and Defense Departments.

In a meeting Tuesday with journalists covering military and veteran issues, President Barack Obama said veterans' health benefits would not be hurt by his health care push.

Veterans who enrolled in a plan that required payment could receive "some help in paying for their premiums, depending on what their income levels were," Obama said. "So it'll actually give them more choice and more flexibility."

The third commitment the veterans' service groups want from Congress is that vets not have to pay a tax on the care, and Violante said top congressional leaders in the health debate -- including Buyer -- have vowed to address the tax concern when the House returns from its August recess.

"One of the biggest problems is people dealing with health care don't usually understand veterans health care, and people that understand veterans health care … don't think they're really able to communicate with anyone" on the Hill, Violante added. "I don't know if they sought [veterans'] input on this, so that was the problem."

Violante, like other VSO reps interviewed by Military.com, said his group is not opposed to health care reform, but is merely looking out for veteran interests in any potential legislation.

Herschel Gober, national legislative director for the Order of the Purple Heart, said his group wants to make sure that whatever options come out of health reform are available to vets and their families.

"We're like all Americans. We realize something has to be done with the health care," he said.

Herb Rosenbleeth, national executive director of Jewish War Veterans of the USA, concurred.

"Veterans want to make sure their earned access to health care is not going to be diluted by health care reform," he said.

Thomas S. Zampieri, director of government relations for the Blinded Veterans Association, said his group is "actually in favor of healthcare reform."

"A lot of my friends who don't use the [VA] system run into problems of paying high rates for private plans, or they're told they had a preexisting condition and couldn't get coverage at all," Zampieri added. "I don't know how it [the legislation] will turn out, but I think it will help because there are several million veterans who don't use the VA's health care."