A Report to the Veterans Caucus, Democratic Party of Oregon

Malcom Gregory Scott

March 16, 2025

Veterans Paying the Price in Every State

The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is experiencing significant staffing challenges due to recent federal workforce reductions (RIF) initiated by President Donald Trump and overseen by Elon Musk, putative head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). These measures have led to the termination of contracts, many held by companies owned by Service Connected Disabled Veterans (SCDV), the failure to fill already open “mission critical” positions, and the interruption of research projects that are essential to veterans health, affecting wait times, services availability, and quality of services for veterans in every state. Watchdog agencies and veterans organizations now fear that the plan is to disrupt VHA operations through RIF and funding cuts so they can use the inevitable disfunction to justify privatization of large parts of the system. Veterans almost universally oppose such an outcome.

What’s at Stake Nationwide

The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is the largest integrated healthcare system in the United States. 

The VHA serves 9.1 million veterans with services ranging from primary medical care to highly specialized treatments of conditions unique to or more likely among service members. Studies show the VHA consistently delivers care comparable to private healthcare or better.

The VHA employs about 480,000 people, of whom 120,000 to 144,000 are themselves veterans.

The VHA awards and administers 90,000 contracts disbursing about 67 billion dollars yearly. In 2023, the agency’s Inspector General found 3.2 billion dollars of that total were “improper and unknown” payments. 

The VHA, through its affiliations with 1,800 educational institutions including almost every well-accredited medical school in the U.S., provides clinical training for approximately 120,000 health profession trainees annually, including 40,000 physician residents and encompassing over 40 health clinical professions. The VHA trains 1000 psychologists every year. 70% of all doctors practicing in the U.S. received part or all of their training through a VHA facility. 

VHA’s 170 hospital system is the front lines for innovative medical research, enrolling tens of thousands of veterans into experimental protocols every year, and credited with such breakthroughs as the pacemaker, the nicotine patch, and the use of aspirin to prevent heart attacks.

Even the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 concluded the VA had transformed itself into “one of the most respected US agencies.”

What’s at Stake in Oregon

The VHA serves more than 130,000 veteran enrollees in the state of Oregon, employing over 6,000 people at two medical centers with hospitals in Portland and Rosenburg, and more than twenty additional outpatient medical centers. In FY 2023, the last for which data is available, VHA Oregon treated more than 96,000 unique patients.

The 130,000 Oregon veterans enrolled in VHA comprise only half of the more than 266,000 veterans residing in the state. As the population ages, and more veterans enroll under the PACT Act, Oregon’s VHA system will require the capacity and flexibility to accommodate the consequent growth.

The overall resident veteran population is overwhelmingly male, with females accounting for about 11%. A plurality of the overall veteran population (101, 927) served during the Gulf War Era and nearly as many (90,915) served in the Vietnam Era. Age cohorts follow a similar pattern, half being 65 and older (133,480) and nearly as many being between 40 and 64 (96,339). The overall Oregon veteran population represents about 1.7% of veterans nationwide, and Oregon VHA enrollees represent about 1.4% of VHA enrollees nationwide.

Firings, a Freeze, and a Promise

DOGE summarily dismissed more than 1000 employees from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in the first phase of the RIF targeting probationary employees, many of whom are themselves veterans. 

The exact number of those who had worked at VHA is not available to date, but, from the fact that VHA employs 371,000 of the 412,892 overall VA workforce, more than 89%, we might easily extrapolate that as many as nine in ten of those fired included healthcare professionals, researchers, and support staff working at VHA medical centers.

The hiring freeze has also disrupted VHA workplaces, patient care, and the lives of job candidates already in the pipeline for the thousands of job openings posted by the VHA. In accordance with the PACT Act, VHA facilities everywhere were hiring new staff to accommodate the expansion in services. Now all of those jobs will remain unfilled, making implementation of the new law nearly impossible. Even special job programs geared to placing SCVDs in VHA jobs have ended, with at least one job candidate so far along in the hiring process as to have already relocated when they were told the position was no longer available. 

VA secretary Doug Collins is now calling for 80,000 additional job cuts while also promising to exempt 300,000 doctors and nurses considered “mission critical”. This would decrease total staffing to 2019 levels of abut 400,000, before the PACT Act expanded benefits to more than a million veterans suffering the consequences of severe exposure to toxins. 

Predicting how many VHA employees will be fired here in Oregon is difficult, but, assuming loss of 15% of personnel, as is expected system-wide, Oregon might expect to lose as many as 900 of these jobs. 

 Contractual Chaos, Lost Support Staff, and Interrupted Research

DOGE created uncertainty and confusion amid its mass cancellations and partial reinstatements of hundreds of VHA contracts. The VHA originally cancelled 875 contracts but rescinded 290 of those cancellations after considerable staff resistance, public reaction, and congressional pressure. The 290 rescinded contracts were exempted because the contracted services involved direct interaction with VHA patients. Some employees have criticized this distinction, noting that many contracted services that do not involve direct interaction with VHA patients may nonetheless be “mission critical” for providing quality services to veterans. The 585 cancelled contracts include agreements for such services as medical supply acquisition, delivery, and inventory tracking, and other services essential to managing clinical operations. Moreover, a large majority of the cancelled contracts appear to be held by businesses owned by SCDV, doubling the harm to veterans caused by the cancellations.

DOGE’s purge of probationary employees has required some VHA facilities to fire support staff including workers who purchase medical supplies, schedule appointments, and arrange rides for patients to their doctors. The federal hiring freeze has exacerbated the shortage of VHA support staff as many previously open positions for custodial workers, laundry staff, and chaplains will now remain unfilled.

In its firing of probationary employees, DOGE also interrupted advanced medical research studies that often require support staff who do not interact with VHA patients. Those affected even included some research support staff only nominally employed by VHA and actually paid by another party involved in the study. The loss of these researchers jeopardizes ongoing studies essential for veteran health, including research focusing on such critical areas as veteran suicide prevention, opioid addiction, cancer, and illnesses related to burn pit exposure. At risk overall are 200 research staff conducting 300 trials and providing treatment to 10,000 veterans. Treatments often include sophisticated new medications for advanced conditions, and experts warn their discontinuation is medically and ethically irresponsible, and may cause direct harm to participating veterans. 

Unfilled Positions VHA Oregon

The following job openings are currently listed for VHA Oregon. Presumably, listings for frontline medical personnel are exempted from the hiring freeze, but as you see below, many other crucial support positions (marked *) remain open as well. Additionally, the uncertainty the RIF has created among potential candidates for the open positions, just as it has within the VHA, makes these jobs less desirable and makes hiring qualified people more difficult. This list is not exhaustive; positions made vacant by the RIF are not included here.

Anesthesiologist

* Biomedical Equipment Support Systems, IT (2 positions)

Clinical Laboratory Scientist

Dental Assistant

Dentist

Diagnostic Radiologic Technician

Diagnostic Radiologic Technologist, Computerized Tomography/Diagnostic and Fluoroscopic 

* Food Service Worker (2 positions)

 Health Technician, Clinical Assistant

 Health Technician, Ophthalmology (2 positions)

* Healthcare Engineer (3 positions)

 Intermediate Care Technician

Licensed Practical Nurse (open continuous announcement)

Licensed Practical Nurse, PACT 

Licensed Practical Nurse, PAVE

Licensed Practical Nurse, Telehealth Clinical Technician (2 positions)

Licensed Professional Mental Health Counselor, Behavioral Health Interdisciplinary Program 

Licensed Professional Mental Health Counselor (2 positions)

* Materials Handler 

Medical Instrument Technician, Anesthesia

Medical Instrument Technician, Polysomnography (2 positions)

* Medical Records Administrator, Chief

* Medical Supply Technician, Sterile Processing

* Medical Support Assistant, Clinical Contact Center, Advanced

* Medical Support Assistant, Office Automation

Nurse (3 positions)

Nurse, Community Care Coordinator 

Nurse, ER

Nurse Manager, Home Based Primary Care

Nurse Practitioner, Primary Care 

Nurse Practitioner, Advanced Practice Nurse 

Physician, Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, or Pediatrics

Physician, Family Practice

Nursing Assistant (open continuous announcement) 

Peer Specialist (2 positions)

Pharmacist, Clinical

Physician, Family Practice

Physician, Movement Disorder (part time)

Physician Assistant, Primary Care 

* Pipe-fitter

Practical Nurse

Primary Care Physician

Psychiatrist, Lead

Psychiatrist 

Psychologist, Staff (2 positions)

Registered Nurse, Nurse Manager

Registered Nurse, Revenue Utilization Review

* Social Worker, Behavioral Health Interdisciplinary {Program

* Social Worker, Housing Specialist (4 positions)

* Social Worker, Senior (2 positions)

* Supervisory Biomedical Equipment Support Specialist (2 positions)

• Supervisory Health System Specialist (Executive Assistant to Chief of Staff, VAMC Eugene)

Fighting Back

Workforce reductions at VHA have sparked criticism from lawmakers and veteran advocacy groups. A coalition of twenty state attorneys general, including Oregon’s Dan Rayfield, filed suit in federal court to stop the illegal mass firings of probationary employees. On March 14th the court ruled with the plaintiffs, issuing a temporary restraining order (TRO) that requires the government to reinstate the employees at 18 federal agencies, including the VHA. Labor unions representing federal workers have won similar suits in federal courts. Whether the Trump administration will comply with the TROs remains to be seen. 

Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) has introduced the “Protect Veterans Jobs Act” to rehire veterans terminated in recent firings, highlighting the adverse effects the RIF has on veterans who comprise over a third of the federal workforce, including at the VHA. 

To better understand the impact of the RIF at VHA on Oregon veterans, Senators Merkley and Wyden have met with representatives from the American Legion and other veterans service organizations. 

The American Legion has created a portal at www.votervoice.net where veterans who have been affected as an employee, a job candidate or a veteran seeking services can share their stories. News outlets like the New York Times and AP News are also asking for and publishing veterans’ first hand accounts. 

On Friday, veterans organized under the banner of Fourteenth Now to stage protests in Washington, D.C., and numerous state capitols like Salem. Democratic governors in some states are actively recruiting displaced federal workers to fill state positions, aiming to mitigate the impact of the federal cuts and support those who have lost their jobs.

 VoteVets.org, a progressive political action committee, is taking a stand on behalf of its 1.5 million veteran families, and provides news updates about DOGE’s actions on its website. 

Throughout Oregon, Indivisible chapters, 50501, and the Federal Unionists Network are also protesting federal workforce reductions in general, and may be enlisted in action directed at the VHA provided some direction and encouragement.

The following organizations oppose the RIF and are supporting veterans through this challenging time:

Disabled American Veterans

Fourteenth Now

Nurses Organization of Veterans Affairs

Veterans for Peace

Veterans of Foreign Wars

Vote Vets

Conclusion

VA Medical Centers here in Oregon and across the country are coping with a substantial number of unfilled clinical and support positions across multiple categories. While exact real-time vacancy figures can fluctuate, systemwide reporting suggests a shortfall of primary care physicians, a lack of specialist doctors, and many unfilled technician and support roles (e.g. scheduling clerks and medical technicians). Systemwide, 13,000 nursing positions are currently vacant.

Here in Oregon, the VHA is currently advertising more than sixty open positions, and these do not include vacancies already created by the RIF. Those listed include a dozen vacancies for nurses, eight for physicians, and five for social workers. At least a dozen of the positions are for roles unlikely to be exempted from the hiring freeze if the definition of “mission critical” roles is not expanded to include jobs that directly facilitate patient care even if the employee never has contact with patients. Those unlikely to make the cut range from singular administrative roles, such as the Executive Assistant to the Chief of Staff for VAMC Eugene, to food service workers.

Veterans advocates, employee unions, and lawmakers are raising alarms that these vacancies are straining the system and potentially impacting patient care quality. Until hiring resumes in full and vacancies are filled, VHA Oregon must continue to operate with lean staffing, relying on remaining employees to shoulder extra duties. Officials have pledged to prioritize hiring in “mission-critical” areas and have exempted many health care jobs from the freeze, so there is some remaining hope that VHA Oregon’s vacant doctor, nurse, and technician positions can be filled in the near future. However, even that immediate relief would not address an ongoing concern that the Trump administration intends to “break” the VHA so they will have an excuse to privatize it — at great cost to Oregon’s veteran households.

Sources:

About VHA, www.va.gov (viewed March 7, 2025).

Rony Caryn Rabin and Nicholas Nehemas, “Chaos at the V.A.: Inside the DOGE Cuts Disrupting the Veterans Agency”, The New York Times, March 9, 2025.

Sonner Kehrt, “Battered by Cuts and Firings, VA Employees Describe Seven Veterans Under ‘Invisible Cloud of Dread.” The Warhorse, March 7, 2025.

Sonner Kehrt, “The VA Promised DOGE Cuts Won’t Harm Veterans. Employees Say It’s Already Happening.”Mother Jones, March 8, 2025.

Meg Kinnard, “A comprehensive look at DOGE’s firings and layoffs so far.” www.apnews.com (viewed March 7, 2025).

 www.data.va.gov (viewed March 7, 2025).

www.usa.jobs.gov (viewed March 14, 2025).

Brooks D. Tucker, “Department of Veterans Affairs”, Project 2025: Mandate for Leadership, pages 641-655, The Heritage Foundation, Paul Dans & Steven Groves (editors), 2023.

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