H.R. 1364, ASSIST Act of 2025; H.R. 1423, Guard and Reserve GI Bill Parity Act of 2025; H.R. 1458, VETS Opportunity Act of 2025; H.R. 1527, Reforming Education for Veterans Act; H.R. 1793, Veterans Readiness and Employment Transparency Act of 2025; H.R. 1815, VA Home Loan Program Reform Act; H.R. 1872, Fairness in Veterans’ Education Act; H.R. 1960, Simplifying Veterans Assistance Act of 2025; H.R. 913, Streamlining Aviation for Eligible Veterans Act of 2025; and H.R. 980, Modernizing the Veterans On-Campus Experience Act of 2025
House Veterans' Affairs Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity
2025-04-09
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Source: Congress.gov
Participants
Transcript
Subcommittee will come to order. Thank you for being here, gentlemen and ladies. Nice to see you. Today we're going to be marking up 10 bills, several of which I'll be asking unanimous consent to consider and block. All these bills were considered at a legislative hearing in this subcommittee. I'm supportive of the bills on today's agenda as they're important measures that will improve the lives of veterans and their families by modernizing the GI Bill program, providing additional resources to disabled veterans, and improving the VA home loan program. Several of these bills are the product of bipartisan negotiations. I hope everyone in the subcommittee will support these bills and continue to work together to address the concerns as we move forward in the legislative process. In accordance with committee rules, the subcommittee has contacted the Congressional Budget Office seeking informal preliminary cost estimates for each of the bills being considered. Many of these preliminary scores are only a range of potential costs because the subcommittee has not received official cost estimates on the bills from the Congressional Budget Office. None of these bills being considered today include the offsets that will be necessary to move these bills forward in the legislative process. However, as we work to refine the list of bills that will be considered at full committee markup and bills that may be considered on the House floor, we will need to find offsets to ensure that we are in accordance with House rules. We want to make sure that we're not passing legislation that will increase the debt and burden the American taxpayer, of which our veterans are also American taxpayers. Let's never forget that. I should note that there are still multiple opportunities to improve and make necessary changes to these bills. The ranking member and I will continue to work with our colleagues in the committee and any stakeholders that have feedback on these bills as we continue to work through the legislative process. I'm very proud of the nonpartisan nature of this committee and it will continue in that way under my leadership and in the leadership of ranking member Pappas. One of these bills that we are considering is my solution to help veterans that have gotten behind on their mortgages and cannot catch up by refinancing due to the high interest rates in the current market. These veterans on average are less than $20,000 in arrearances.
And I believe that partial claim fix offers a fiscally responsible solution that is in line with other government agencies with the administration's recent change to the VAST program. It is much, excuse me, it's more important than ever that we act now to provide options for veterans. And what this does simply is it aligns the Veterans Affairs administration with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. That's all it's doing. We're leveling the bubbles across all of the government programs where you can borrow money and I think that is prudent. Several of these improvements have been addressed in my amendment in the nature of a substitute today to make sure we get this right. I look forward to continuing to work with stakeholders and the minority to get this through committee and act it as soon as possible so that veterans have access to the support they might need. One of the other bills under consideration today is my bill to improve veterans' experience on college campuses. My bill would make it easier to hire individuals to fill VSOC positions on college campuses nationwide, as there is currently a dearth of them. I look forward to working with the ranking member on these bills being marked up today to ensure that we're doing the right thing for the veterans. And I'd now like to recognize my great friend, Mr. Pappas, for any opening remarks you may have. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Good to be with you, and thanks for holding today's markup.
I want to commend you for the productive bipartisan discussion we had during last month's legislative hearing, but I think we can't ignore a step that VA took just six days ago. VA and DOES unilaterally ended the Veterans Affairs Servicing Purchase Program, which is a critical home loan assistance program that serves an estimated 15,000 veterans today. The abrupt ending of VASP will have a devastating impact on veterans. Thousands of vets and their families are at risk of losing their homes. There's no question about that, especially as there's no functional alternative in place or one that's expected to be signed into law anytime soon. Last week, VA suddenly announced the end of VASP. This committee recognizes that there are issues with VASP. We've held hearings and have been working on this. But for VA to unilaterally end the program without bipartisan legislation having been drafted and discussed by our committee is, I believe, cruel and disrespectful to veterans who are already facing financial challenges. So let's be clear. This is not a partisan issue like you, Mr. Chairman. I don't care who's in the White House. If the Biden administration made the same decision, I would be just as upset. This is about policy and the best solutions to ensure that veterans are protected to avoid foreclosure. And now that VASP has been ended, that's got to be a focus of ours jointly.
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