Trump Picks Former Rep. Doug Collins to Head Veterans Affairs
Maybe Collins can finally clean up the VA.
President-elect Donald Trump picked former Georgia Republican Rep. Doug Collins as Secretary of Veterans Affairs (VA).
“Doug is a Veteran himself, who currently serves our Nation as a Chaplain in the United States Air Force Reserve Command, and fought for our Country in the Iraq War,” wrote Trump. “We must take care of our brave men and women in uniform, and Doug will be a great advocate for our Active Duty Servicemembers [sic], Veterans, and Military Families to ensure they have the support they need.”
#BREAKING: Trump announces former Congressman Doug Collins for Veterans Affairs secretary pic.twitter.com/MPUcSkGrTy
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) November 14, 2024
Collins represented Georgia’s 9th Congressional District from 2013 to 2021.
Collins ran for the Georgia Senate seat in the November 2020 special election. He placed third behind then-incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler.
The seat went to Democrat Raphael Warnock.
The VA has been a mess for a long time in Republican and Democrat administrations. For some reason, our country cannot take care of our veterans.
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Comments
I hope Trump is right about this guy.
He is.
There’s a reason Gov Kemp didn’t appoint him to the senate …
Doug was formerly our congressman. We’ve met him and he strikes me as a very straight up guy. Great choice!
I think a good choice
I hope so. So far it would be easier to shovel out the Augean Stables with a spoon than clear up the VA..
Another surprise but a solid pick, I think.
It’s gonna take more than a strong VA Sec to fix the VA. Congress is gonna have to vote for changes that will PO some constituents. The location of large VA Hospitals is one example. These locations were mostly selected in the post WWII era / draft era. Many are clustered in larger metro areas. That made some sense when the population they are.supposed to serve, Veterans, more/less corresponded to a distribution that reflected the overall population. That hasn’t been the case since the end of the draft era in early ’70s.
The WWII and Korea generation of Veterans is practically gone. Today most VA eligble Veterans are not clustered in the large metro areas near VA Hospitals. Instead many live in rural areas particularly in the Southeast and West. Closing the big VA facilities in areas with lower population density of VA eligible Veterans is a political landmine. It’s the right thing to do both in efficiency and in providing better VA services to more VA eligible Veterans who don’t have a nearby VA Hospital but gonna take stones to do it. Local politicians will howl b/c of loss of good paying jobs and complain that their local Veterans are getting shafted.
Just to correct something in Trump’’s announcement: Collin’s didn’t fight in any war. As a chaplain he is a noncombatant. He served but didn’t fight.
Give 2ndA’ Rights back to vets in va’s system