admin
When Doug Collins declared, “We’re not that VA anymore,” he wasn’t mouthing a slogan — he was announcing a reckoning with the entrenched bureaucracy that for years treated veterans like a line item instead of human beings. That plain-speaking promise, made on a national conservative program, captures the impatience millions of vets and their families feel toward a system that too often deflects blame rather than delivers care.
Collins came into the job with a clear, unapologetic agenda: strip out DEI distractions, redirect funds to frontline care, and restore a culture of service and accountability at the top. His team has already moved money away from programs that didn’t directly serve veterans and put it back into healthcare and caregiver support — small but symbolic steps that show priorities have finally shifted.
This is not a rhetorical change; Collins was sworn in as Secretary of Veterans Affairs on February 5, 2025, and he’s moving at the pace of someone who understands that promises to veterans aren’t warm words but deadlines. The country elected a leader willing to endure political heat for the simple principle that our veterans deserve efficient, results-driven government.
That results-driven posture includes the hard decisions Washington rarely makes: a broad review and planned downsizing of nonessential roles at the VA to eliminate waste and restore mission focus. The administration’s memo and reporting about plans to reduce the workforce back toward 2019 levels — roughly a 70,000-person recalibration — shocked the swamp but reflected a basic conservative premise: government must be lean where it can and robust where it must.
Collins didn’t stumble into these reforms; he’s repeatedly promised accountability and faster service during his confirmation discussions and public interviews, stressing that poor performers won’t be shielded by bureaucratic inertia. That kind of leadership — willing to use existing accountability tools and confront union and media pressure — is exactly what veterans’ advocates asked for when they demanded a VA that puts the veteran first.
Of course, the usual suspects screamed that cuts equal cruelty: senators, union bosses, and partisan media reacted predictably, weaponizing fear about wait times and care. Those attacks are transparent political theater; the real question is whether the VA will stop defending a bloated status quo or continue to use veterans as an excuse to protect cushy jobs and irrelevant programs. Collins is making the case that protecting the veteran means protecting results, not job lines.
Patriots who put on the uniform and returned home expecting a thankful nation deserve nothing less than a modern, accountable VA that measures outcomes and fixes problems fast. Secretary Collins’ message is simple and decisive: stop the excuses, cut the waste, and put resources where they actually help veterans. If conservatives stay vigilant and support this fight, Washington’s bureaucrats will learn that serving veterans is a sacred duty, not a political shield.
