Statement of Administration Policy: S. 2100 - Veterans Benefits and Health Care Amendments of 1990

(Senate)
(Cranston (D) CA and 16 others)

The Administration strongly opposes the enactment of S. 2100 because it would exempt the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Care appropriation from sequestration under Gramm-Rudman- Hollings (GRH). The importance of health care for veterans, and the need to cushion the effect of a sequester, is already recognized under current law. The VA Medical Care program, Medicare, and other health care programs are protected by a two percent cap on sequestration of certain activities. Exemption of the VA Medical Care appropriation from sequester is ill-advised and could encourage program-by-program exemptions that circumvent the discipline of sequestration.

Unless S. 2100 is amended to delete the exemption from sequestration, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs and the President's other senior advisers will recommend that the bill be vetoed.

S. 2100 also contains other objectionable provisions, which the Administration will seek to correct during House consideration of the bill. The most seriously objectionable provisions would:

—  Extend the presumption of service-connection for radiation- exposure to veterans who participated in certain military activities. The Administration believes that compensation benefits should only be awarded after considering documented radiation dose and be based on scientific and medical evidence. Section 113 could have disastrous consequences on future military projects and harm our national security.

—  Create statutory presumptions of service-oonnection for Agent Orange among Vietnam veterans who suffer non-Hodgkin's lymphoma or soft-tissue sarcomas. VA has already utilized its authority to decide cases involving these diseases. Presumptions, without scientific evidence, as contained in Section 122, undermine the principle that there exists a relationship between service and disability.

—  Direct VA to furnish priority medical care to any veteran of a war who seeks treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Section 201 bypasses VA's adjudication process and treats the veteran with PTSD as service-connected even though service-connection had not been granted. In addition, it would, for tha first time, give certain veterans a priority for care based on a particular diagnosis without regard to those veterans' actual need.

The Administration supports the bill's provisions providing an annual increase in the rates of compensation for service- disabled veterans and the survivors of veterans who die as a result of service.