Veterans, advocates fear VA cuts could threaten PACT Act benefits

The Department of Veterans Affairs is expected to cut more than 80,000 jobs in the next few months. That may include those who handle PACT Act claims.

Author: Monica Robins

Published: 6:26 PM EST March 7, 2025

Updated: 8:23 PM EST March 7, 2025

CLEVELAND — Susan Zeier of Sandusky spent years traveling across the country at her own expense to advocate for her son-in-law, Ohio Army National Guard Combat Medic Sgt. First Class Heath Robinson. Her mission: Securing health benefits for veterans exposed to toxic burn pits during Middle East deployments.

After Robinson's death in 2020, Zeier's advocacy efforts led to the Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics (PACT) Act, named in his honor. The legislation, passed in 2022, represented the most significant expansion of veterans' benefits in three decades.

Now, advocates like Zeier worry that planned Department of Veterans Affairs layoffs could jeopardize these hard-won benefits.

"Caring for our veterans is waste, and they need to cut that waste," Zeier told 3News in an interview, expressing her frustration. "It makes me feel like the VA is going to go back to 'delay, deny, hope you die,' which a lot of us in the veteran world or the advocate world felt was the VA model before the PACT Act."

Nearly 15,000 Ohio veterans have received health benefits through the PACT Act, many after previous denials. Zeier fears these gains could be reversed.

"How many are going to give up hope now? They had hope with the PACT Act passing, and now they're worried it's going to be taken away," she said. "Our government is absolutely going to cut the budget on the backs of veterans. It's unconscionable."

Ohio U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno supports President Donald Trump's plans to reduce government spending, but acknowledges his office is receiving thousands of daily calls from concerned federal workers who have lost their jobs or may be at risk.

"There are times when they (people making the cuts) get it wrong, and we have a process in place to make certain that, 'Hey, if that happened — like, that one employee should not have been terminated — we get them right back on,'" Moreno said during an event Friday at the Cleveland-Cliffs steel plant. "Because when you're trying to manage a workforce of 2.2 million people that we can't afford — we have a $36.5 trillion budget (debt), we have to trim the size of the federal workforce — you're going to make some mistakes."

The VA is expected to complete an internal review by May and finalize a reorganization plan by June, with layoffs scheduled to begin in August. While the department claims the cuts won't affect veterans' services, it has already terminated probationary employees and canceled hundreds of contracts.

Zeier and fellow advocates are preparing to fight these changes.

"The soldiers exposed to burn pits were poisoned by our government," she emphasized. "These aren't men and women who came down with illnesses unrelated to service; it was negligence on the part of our government to use illegal toxic burn pits to dispose of waste. They poisoned our soldiers, and now it's like, 'Well, it's costing too much money to take care of them.'"

Ohioans fight looming VA cuts that could affect PACT Act benefits | wkyc.com

https://www.concernedveteransoh.org/post/veterans-advocates-fear-va-cuts-could-threaten-pact-act-benefits