Senate Hearing to Consider Pending Legislation
What the Senate Just Told Us About the Future of Veteran Care
The Senate Veterans Affairs Committee closed the year with a marathon session that covered twenty four bipartisan bills and an even wider range of issues affecting veterans, families, caregivers, survivors, and the systems responsible for serving them. It was one part policy briefing, one part accountability hearing, and one part group therapy for everyone who has ever waited on federal paperwork.
The hearing centered on the theme that keeps resurfacing in every 2025 hearing. Veterans deserve a system that does not make care harder to access than combat itself. Senators of both parties pushed that point with urgency, humor, and more than a little frustration.
As Senator Angus King quipped, “If St. Peter gives you ten minutes to live, ask for it during a Senate vote.” In other words, the system moves slowly. This hearing asked how to make it move faster and serve better.
Why This Hearing Mattered
Committee leadership set the tone early. Chairman Jerry Moran emphasized bipartisan commitment to strengthening veteran care through bills like the Fisher House Availability Act and the SERVE Act. Ranking Member Richard Blumenthal warned that 267 thousand veterans were on the brink of losing Affordable Care Act enhanced tax credits, a loss that would push far more veterans into an already strained VA system.
Then came the witnesses. From senior VA officials to leaders at Paralyzed Veterans of America, VFW, and the National Veterans Legal Services Program, the message was consistent. The status quo needs reinforcement, modernization, and a dramatic increase in transparency.
The bills under consideration touched nearly every challenge veterans face: access to nearby care, rural healthcare shortages, infertility treatment, survivor benefit delays, appeals that drag on for years, and the persistent gaps created by toxic exposure.
Panel One: VA Leadership Under Tight Scrutiny
1. Access to Care and Interagency Collaboration
Chairman Moran pressed VA leaders about the SERVE Act, which aims to improve collaboration between the VA and Department of Defense. Dr. Thomas O’Toole highlighted promising models such as the Lovell Federal Health Care Center while acknowledging that credentialing and coordination still need work.
The goal is simple. If a military treatment facility has capacity and a VA patient lives nearby, let the veteran be seen there. Ending the turf wars could eliminate thousands of barriers overnight.
2. Fisher House Availability Act
The bill clarifies who can stay in Fisher Houses when service members or veterans receive care nearby. This sounds procedural but has real impact. Families often sleep in cars or spend hundreds on hotels while their loved one receives care. A clear policy means less confusion and more compassion.
3. Toxic Exposure and Descendant Research
Senators from both parties expressed concern about generational effects of toxic exposure. The VA leaned heavily on a 2018 study that found no proven generational link. Senators countered that veterans do not feel reassured by old studies and want active research into reproductive harm and impacts on children of burn pit exposed veterans.
4. ACA Premium Tax Credits and Cost Shifting
If ACA tax credits expired, 267 thousand veterans would lose affordable coverage. When asked what that would mean for VA capacity and costs, Dr. O’Toole did not dispute that impact would reach billions.
In short. Congress failing to act would hand the VA a bill they cannot pay.
5. IVF, Reproductive Health, and Veteran Families
Senator Patty Murray criticized stalled IVF policies and challenged the VA to acknowledge infertility rates among service members. She pushed strongly for expanding fertility treatment, a point that resonates deeply with many post 9/11 families.
6. Rural Veterans and Critical Access Hospitals
Senator Kevin Cramer delivered one of the strongest critiques of the hearing. He argued that VA authorization rules force rural veterans to wait weeks or months for access to care their civilian neighbors can receive immediately at critical access hospitals. He called the system discriminatory.
The VA agreed on the goal but suggested technical language changes.
7. Fraud, Scams, and Data Failures
Senator Maggie Hassan highlighted hundreds of millions in reported scam losses affecting veterans and military families. The VA testified that they had prevented 9.6 million in theft and supported codifying a fraud prevention officer.
Meanwhile, Senators Blumenthal and Slotkin hammered the VA for failing to provide overdue data on wait times and community care record returns. The VA promised updates, but committee patience wore thin.
8. Surviving Spouses and Death Certificate Delays
Senator John Boozman raised a painful issue. Families sometimes wait up to eight weeks for a certified death certificate, delaying DIC and survivor benefits. He pushed legislation to allow physician assistants to sign death certificates and shorten the timeline. The VA supported the bill with technical recommendations.
This is one of those issues surviving spouses know too well. A system that delays closure at the worst moment in a family’s life is unacceptable.
9. Suicide Prevention and Firearm Safety
Senator Angus King again pressed for his firearm lock box bill. He cited the staggering statistic that one veteran dies by firearm suicide roughly every two hours. Dr. O’Toole supported the principle and described VA’s existing lock box distribution for at risk veterans, though he suggested the bill’s funding and scope needed refinement.
10. Falls Prevention
Falls are one of the leading causes of disability among older veterans. Senator King called fall prevention “low hanging fruit” that saves both lives and dollars. The VA argued they already created a falls office, creating a polite tug of war over whether new authority is necessary or redundant.
Panel Two: Veteran Organizations Offer Clear, Candid Feedback
If Panel One was technical, Panel Two brought the human impact into sharper focus.
1. Review Every Veteran’s Claim Act
Both PVA and VFW supported this bill. Their message was blunt. Veterans are too often denied claims simply because they missed a disability exam, sometimes due to contractor failures or medical limitations. The bill pushes the VA to use existing evidence rather than default to denial.
2. Veterans Appeals Efficiency Act
All three witnesses strongly endorsed this legislation as a way to speed up appeals, encourage precedential decisions, restore meaningful class actions, and reduce remands that stall claims for years.
This bill could fundamentally improve how quickly justice is delivered in the VA claims system.
3. SERVE Act
Every witness supported it. Each organization emphasized that shared VA–DoD care could improve continuity, reduce travel, save money, and help veterans transition out of service more smoothly.
4. Pre-enrollment in VA Healthcare
Senator King asked whether PVA supported allowing active duty service members to pre-enroll in VA healthcare before separation to avoid care gaps. They did. That single policy change could prevent countless delays in treatment immediately after service.
5. Falls Prevention and Safety
Witnesses supported both strengthening existing VA programs and ensuring veterans receive fall screening at every medical appointment.
Special Focus Areas:
Mental Health and Suicide Prevention
The hearing underlined that suicide prevention remains one of the VA’s top priorities. Senators pushed for more lethal means safety tools, faster implementation, and more transparency in outcomes.
IT and Data Problems
No matter the topic, one problem kept resurfacing. The VA struggles to deliver data, retrieve community care records, and track veterans consistently. Senators were not subtle in their criticism.
Contracting and Accountability
Lawmakers demanded more transparency on DOGE related contract cuts. Veteran groups pushed for better interagency agreements to share resources efficiently.
Surviving Spouses
Delays in death certificates, DIC processing, and burial honors received significant attention. The VA highlighted improvements but acknowledged persistent barriers. Surviving spouses deserve better than waiting weeks to bury their loved one or access earned benefits.
Women Veterans and IVF
The conversation around infertility and IVF affordability was forceful. Advocates emphasized the moral obligation to help veterans build families after service-connected reproductive harm.
What This Hearing Signals for 2026
If the Senate’s tone is any guide, 2026 will involve three major trends.
1. Bipartisan pressure for faster care
Both parties pushed the VA on wait times, rural access, and data transparency. This pressure is unlikely to fade.
2. Renewed focus on survivors, reproductive health, and generational impacts of toxic exposure
Surviving spouses, women veterans, and children of toxic exposed veterans all received sustained attention that could drive new legislation. * As an Agent Orange baby and a surviving spouse of a soldier who served in Afghanistan, I appreciate this.
3. Real momentum for structural reforms in claims and appeals
The Review Every Veteran’s Claim Act and the Veterans Appeals Efficiency Act have strong support. If passed, they could dramatically change the pace and fairness of claims processing.
Final Thoughts
This hearing was a reminder that veteran policy is not abstract. It affects living people every day. Veterans trying to access care in rural towns. Surviving spouses waiting for a death certificate so they can bury their loved one. Families struggling with infertility after service (as an AO baby with health issues, I have mixed feelings on this). Veterans navigating appeals that outlast wars.
The message from the Senate was clear. Federal systems must move faster, communicate better, collaborate widely, and prioritize the people they serve over processes that no longer work.
As Senator King said, falls prevention is low hanging fruit. Many of the reforms discussed are too. The question now is whether Congress and the VA will reach out and pick it.
