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Senate Republicans on Wednesday blocked a bill to help veterans exposed to toxic burn poison weeks after the measure initially passed the Senate with 84 votes, angering Democrats, veterans groups and comedian Jon Stewart, a of the main advocates of helping the community.
Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), chairman of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, was particularly outraged by the turn of events. Tester, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), other lawmakers and Stewart on Thursday morning joined veterans outside the Capitol, who originally came to Washington to see the bill passed, to attack the GOP.
“It just makes the gut punch more devastating,” Stewart said, given the number of veterans who came to Washington hoping the bill would pass. “His constituents are dying.”
“This is a shame,” he added.
Jon Stewart joined Democratic lawmakers in the district on July 28 after Senate Republicans blocked a new plan to help millions of veterans. (Video: The Washington Post)
The bill would significantly change the way the Department of Veterans Affairs cares for veterans who were exposed to toxic substances by requiring VA to assume that certain illnesses are linked to exposure to hazardous waste incineration, focusing primarily on on the issue of cremation pits from recent wars. This would remove the burden of proof from wounded veterans.
Democrats accused Republicans of voting against it in retaliation for a deal announced earlier by Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (DN.Y.) and Sen. Joe Manchin III (DW.Va.) that it will allow Democrats to advance on an economic issue. , health and climate package without Republican votes.
Republicans say that’s not true. Instead, they point a budget policy conflict between the two parties.
Tester shared his frustration and confusion with Republican lawmakers who supported the bill a few weeks ago but reversed course and voted against moving it forward Wednesday.
“I’ve been in this business for 25 years in the state legislature and here, and I’ve never seen anything happen like what happened yesterday,” he said. “And what complicates it and makes it much more difficult is that, in essence, yesterday we took away benefits from people who have been affected by a war that we started.
“And we turn our backs and say, ‘No, we’re going to find an excuse to vote against our veterans,’ while we’re waving the flag, talking about how great our fighters are,” Tester added.
Biden calls for legislation to help sick veterans who served near burn pits
Pelosi said the Republicans’ actions are particularly unusual, given that helping veterans usually attracts significant bipartisan support.
“I’m very saddened that 80 percent of Republicans in the United States Senate said no to veterans yesterday,” he said Thursday. “Eighty percent. Forty votes, no.”
“Veterans have waited too long, too long,” Pelosi added. “Three and a half million veterans will benefit, they have the possibility to benefit from this legislation. Why subject them to this?”
The veterans, some wearing American flag T-shirts and others wearing masks, held signs. One read, “Sick and dying veterans need health care,” while another held the GOP accountable with the words, “Veterans’ blood is on Republican hands.”
A version of the legislation passed the Senate by a vote of 84-14 in June. It returned to the Senate Wednesday as the House made modest changes before passing the bill in a 342-88 vote about two weeks ago.
Tester took to Twitter after the vote to express his dismay at the result.
“In an eleventh-hour act of cowardice, Republicans today chose to rob generations of toxic-exposed veterans in this country of their hard-earned and desperately needed health care and benefits,” he tweeted. “Make no mistake: The American people are sick and tired of these games.”
On Wednesday, the revised measure won 55 votes in the Senate, short of the 60 needed to overcome a filibuster. Twenty-five Republicans who previously supported versions of the bill voted against it on the procedural vote.
Jeremy Butler, executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, called on Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) to switch to a no vote Wednesday.
“After voting to support the #PACTAct and her fellow veterans, Senator Joni Ernst turned her back on them yesterday and voted NO,” he tweeted. “What happened Senator? Iowa vets are still getting sick and dying from toxic exposures.”
Manchin says he ‘never left’ as Democrats push for spending deal
Republicans rejected the idea that the Democrats’ reconciliation deal was the reason for their switch.
Wednesday’s failed vote had its roots in the budget policy dispute first raised last month by Sen. Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.), who objected to the way the bill it would change the accounting for about $400 billion in pre-existing veterans’ spending.
This previously authorized spending had been designated as discretionary, that is, subject to annual appropriations by Congress. But the bill, known as the PACT Act, authorizes $280 billion in new mandatory spending — meaning not subject to annual appropriations — and also converts the previous $400 billion in authorizations from discretionary to mandatory.
That, Toomey first argued last month, amounts to a budget “gimmick” that could facilitate massive amounts of new appropriations spending: “Why would they do something like that?” he said in a speech on the floor on June 24. “The reason is because that creates a big hole in the discretionary spending category, which can be filled with another $400 billion of totally unrelated spending, on who knows what.”
In the weeks that followed, Toomey worked behind the scenes to raise awareness among his Republican colleagues about the issue and pushed for prior spending to return to the discretionary category. But Democrats wouldn’t agree to an amendment, so Republicans voted en masse against advancing the bill Wednesday to force the issue.
“Pennsylvania’s senior senator has an amendment that will ensure that we don’t just put a financial Band-Aid on the problem, but actually fix the underlying accounting problem,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Thursday. in a speech on the Senate floor.
Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), the No. 2 leader of the GOP, said Thursday that the GOP’s lopsided vote was “separate” from any reaction to the Manchin-Schumer deal, but said hurt feelings could make it harder to find a solution. “Obviously, it doesn’t help,” he said.
After Wednesday’s failed vote, Toomey said an amendment could allow the bill to pass quickly: “My concern with this bill has nothing to do with the purpose of the bill,” he said. to say. “It’s a budget gimmick that’s intended to make it possible for there to be a huge burst of unrelated spending — $400 billion.”
But Democrats said the effort to amend the bill amounted to political gamesmanship. Tester rebutted Toomey on Wednesday, saying it was strange to think that Congress would ever spend that amount of money on unrelated programs through the bipartisan appropriations process.
“Make no mistake about it, the American people are sick and tired of the games that take place in this body,” he said. “We can make all kinds of excuses about how this is going to change money, but let me tell you something, it’s up to us to decide. If we want to move money, we will; if we don’t, we won’t. In the meantime, let’s pass this bill.”
Toomey rejected the idea that the GOP action was in response to the Manchin-Schumer deal.
“This is so absurd and dishonest that anyone would suggest it has anything to do with BBB,” he said, referring to an earlier iteration known as Build Back Better. “Who knew about BBB, you know, weeks before when I’ve been raising this issue all this time? I’m very clear about that. So someone has to be willfully ignorant of the facts or dishonest to make this charge.”