Donald Trump has issued yet another executive order, this one to address the issue of veteran homelessness.
The money is being reallocated from immigration programs, but Dems will be hard-pressed to complain about it when you consider the beneficiaries of the reallocation of funds.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has been a point of contention between the GOP and Democrats for as long as I can remember.
It continues today, with Dems saying it is not perfect, but far from needing to be overhauled, but the Trump administration would disagree.
For instance, recently, VA Secretary Doug Collins stated, “Our shared goal needs to be making things better for veterans rather than protecting the department’s broken bureaucracy.
“To simply say that where we came in was okay, everyone knows that was just simply not true.”
On Friday, Donald Trump signed an executive order to establish the National Center for Warrior Independence in Los Angeles.
The funding for this would be available by reallocating money that was intended for services for undocumented immigrants. So, Democrats will now have to decide if they want to fight the reallocation of funding, but that could create an attack point for Republicans during the election if they do.
Los Angeles, by far, has more homeless veterans than any other city in the country, with roughly 3,000 homeless veterans in the city.
The White House stated, "The new National Center for Warrior Independence will help them and other veterans like them rebuild their lives.” The announcement continued, "The Center will promote self-sufficiency through housing, substance abuse treatment, and support for productive work for the veterans housed there.”
According to the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), there are more than 40,000 homeless veterans in this country. Roughly 7% of the population in this country are veterans, but veterans make up about 13% of our homeless population, so there is clearly a problem that needs to be addressed here.
Operations Enduring Freedom, Iraqi Freedom, and New Dawn have hit the veteran community particularly hard, responsible for nearly 13,000 homeless veterans, with the number of younger veterans who are homeless seeing a significant rise.
The main culprit behind this is post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. Anyone who has a veteran in their family or a friend who served in the war knows how traumatic this can be for veterans. I used to work at a hotel that served as a transition space for veterans after serving, and I can tell you firsthand that the stories they tell are heartbreaking, and you just never know what can trigger an episode.
If this money was allocated by Congress, legally, Trump is not allowed to reallocate it without congressional approval. If Democrats want to challenge this, they can, but then they have to explain to the American people why they want to help illegal immigrants before helping our veteran homeless, and that will not be an easy sell.
