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Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin said his agenda for the future of the VA Choice Program also aligns with the White House's vision.
Sen. Jon Tester said he'd like to see more proactivity from the VA, especially in recruitment and oversight.
Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin gave a progress report on a wide range of initiatives. He told the Senate VA Committee that the department is still making "incremental change" on hiring, appeals modernization, accountability and a new electronic health record.
The Veterans Affairs Department is expected to run out of funding in the VA Choice Program by the end of 2017. VA Secretary David Shulkin called on lawmakers to find some solution by year-end, even if it's a temporary one.
If confirmed Kirstjen Nielsen would inherit a department that just reversed a six-year trend of declining employee engagement scores.
FEMA officials and lawmakers says a provision in a 29-year-old law may be hurting relief efforts.
Restoring veterans' trust and mending gaps between the department's headquarters and its employees in the field are top priorities for Tom Bowman, the president's nominee to be the deputy VA secretary.
Senators have two very different proposals to redesign the Veterans Choice Program. Both pieces of legislation represent very different ideologies and sides of a debate that Congress, the Veterans Affairs Department, veterans service organizations and federal employee groups have been having for the past three years.
The Recognizing the Environmental Gains in Overcoming Negligence (REGION) Act would prohibit using money set aside in appropriations bills to consolidate or eliminate EPA offices.
The House will pass the VA Accountability First and Whistleblower Protection Act, clearing the way for the President to sign the bill later this week. Some lawmakers and veterans service organizations see the bill's passage as a major win after years of debate over new accountability legislation. But federal employee groups say the bill would do more harm than good.
Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin offered the first glimpse of his plan to redesign the current Veterans Choice Program. He's calling it the Veterans' Coordinated Access Rewarding Experience (CARE) Program, and under the new initiative, veterans would no longer access community providers based on a set of arbitrary, administrative rules.
The president's 2018 budget proposal includes cuts to the Transportation Security Administration and grant programs for local law enforcement. But some senators say the funding increases at other parts of the Homeland Security Department come at the expense of valuable tools to respond to threats at United States ports of entry and smaller scale and local incidents.
President Donald Trump's fiscal 2018 budget request suggests personnel cuts at the majority of the 24 largest federal agencies. But the Homeland Security Department is one of the few that could undergo a bit of a hiring spree next year.
Both the Veterans Affairs and Justice departments believe they can easily resolve some concerns with the constitutionality of the VA Accountability and Whistleblower Protection. DoJ is concerned, however, that VA will run into the same issues that ultimately rendered a controversial provision on firing senior executives unconstitutional.