The Toll on Veterans

This Memorial Day, as we honor those who sacrificed all for the country, it’s also important to take stock of how well the nation cares for our living veterans.

Cuts already made to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, and further cuts that the Trump administration has floated, make clear that we are not giving our all, and perhaps not enough. In fact, the federal government under Donald Trump is running fast in the wrong direction.

Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency saw to it that 2,400 probationary VA staff members were laid off, and the Trump administration set a goal to fire or force out more than 70,000 more — totaling a reduction in force of about one in six VA employees. Ninety percent of the VA’s workforce works in the Veterans Health Administration, so cuts to the VA inevitably lead to cuts to health care for veterans.

A quarter of VA employees are veterans themselves, so the toll of the proposed cuts is twofold for many veterans. And, across the federal government more broadly, nearly 30 percent of federal workers — workers whom Trump accused of “destroying this country” — are veterans.

Musk, the chainsaw-wielding tech billionaire, named his group DOGE after a 2013 internet meme featuring a Shiba Inu. That’s how seriously he takes his supposed task of finding waste and fraud in government agencies.

There are savings and efficiencies to be found in government of any size. The same clinical services could perhaps be delivered at less expense. But DOGE and the Trump administration did not find efficiencies. They canceled services and clinical trials that can be the difference between life and death for veterans. They put contracts on the chopping block that are essential to maintaining and improving patient safety and the level of care that the VA delivers. They even canceled contracts that have already been paid for, meaning taxpayers’ money went to waste — the exact thing that DOGE was supposed to stop.

Among the needlessly counterproductive moves DOGE has planned is an end to remote work options for VA employees, meaning the chronically understaffed Veterans Crisis Line will lose hundreds of workers who have done their jobs effectively and remotely for years. Lost jobs, and less help for veterans in need.

The veteran suicide rate is currently nearly 18 per day, a statistic that is hard to wrap one’s mind around, and one that also makes it difficult to understand why the government would undermine crisis responder recruitment and retention.

There is so much chaos and corruption coming out of the White House these days that it is impossible to give every crisis and $400 million bribe from a foreign country the attention it deserves. But maintaining health care and suicide prevention services in the face of indiscriminate cuts is something we can’t let ourselves lose sight of. Memorial Day seems like the perfect time to pay closer attention to it.