Military & Veterans

The U.S. House passed a bill aimed at reining in overruns and speeding construction on Veterans Affairs hospital projects Monday night in a unanimous voice vote, U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman’s office said. Coffman sponsored the bill after conducting hearings into overruns on several major projects, including a new VA hospital in Aurora. Next the bill heads to the Senate, but consideration there likely will come after a month-long congressional recess that begins at the end of the week. “Once passed i... Read more

The Office of Inspector General (OIG) at the Department of Veterans Affairs briefed congressional staff with numbers on veteran deaths in Phoenix that were much higher than the ones included in the official OIG report. New evidence obtained by The Daily Caller further discredits a widely-publicized OIG report which stated that no conclusive evidence can prove that exam delays from secret waiting lists at the Phoenix VA Medical Center caused veteran deaths. VA leaked the somewhat-favorable OIG r... Read more

Today, U.S. Representative Mike Coffman (R-CO) pressed the Senate to take immediate action on his legislation, the VA Construction Assistance Act, H.R. 3593 which was passed by unanimous consent by the House of Representatives on Tuesday. Coffman’s bill is designed to help speed the construction and rein in cost overruns that have occurred on three major VA regional projects under development in Aurora, Colorado; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Orlando, Florida. Coffman's legislation swiftly gained... Read more

The House has passed a bill to increase oversight of veterans' hospitals under construction, following a report that some medical centers take three years longer to complete than estimated and cost an extra $366 million per project. Republican congressman Mike Coffman of Colorado says the Veterans Affairs Department's oversight of construction projects is dysfunctional and leads to delayed health care. A report by the Government Accountability Office last year found that at least four medical c... Read more

Congressional Republicans are accusing the Department of Veterans Affairs of influencing an independent review of whether delayed health care resulted in the deaths of nearly three dozen patients. The VA’s inspector general released a report last month that said investigators could not “conclusively” link the deaths of 40 veterans to long wait times plaguing the agency. That shocked many Republican lawmakers, who say there’s no question that the two issues are connected. The issue will come to ... Read more

U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman’s bill aimed at speeding construction and reining in costs at three major Veterans Affairs hospital construction projects — including one in won unanimous approval Wednesday from the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee. A spokesman says a vote by the full House is likely next week. The bill, introduced by Coffman in February, is the culmination of efforts by Coffman and others to scrutinize massive cost overruns averaging $300 million on the Aurora hospital project and seve... Read more

Congress is taking action on the costly, delayed construction on the VA Medical Center on the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora thanks to a Colorado representative. The VA Medical Center is one of three projects nationwide that is over budget and plagued with delays. The facility isn’t even close to being completed. It could be as much as three years behind schedule. The House Committee on Veterans Affairs passed legislation that would speed up the construction. Rep. Mike Coffman, a Republican ... Read more

Declarations by the Department of Veterans Affairs inspector general that delays in healthcare at the agency’s Phoenix hospital did not “conclusively” cause patient deaths is an unrealistic standard that is virtually impossible to meet, according to medical experts. “Delay of care may not have been the proximate cause of death," Dr. Gregory Schmunk, past head of the National Association of Medical Examiners, told the Arizona Republic in a story published Wednesday. "But the real question is: Di... Read more

A senior attorney at the Board of Veterans Appeals told lawmakers Wednesday that managers at the agency covered up delays in appeals processing and doctored records to protect their performance bonuses. Lawmakers said they were dismayed not just at the allegations but how closely they echo earlier VA scandals of case manipulation and whistleblower retaliation that have been the source of months of oversight and criticism. In testimony before the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, Kelli Kordich,... Read more

Today, the House Committee on Veterans Affairs passed H.R. 3593, the VA Construction Assistance Act, out of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee with bipartisan support. The legislation was introduced by U.S. Representative Mike Coffman (R-CO), who serves as the chairman of the House Veterans Oversight and Investigations (O&I) Subcommittee where significant problems with the Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) construction practices became public knowledge. Coffman’s proposed reforms are desi... Read more