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Guns, insurrection and the persistence of Trumpism in Republican identity
Two big issues dominate the congressional agenda right now. On the gun issue, it looks unlikely that Congress will do much about what more than 70 percent of Americans believe is a serious national crisis — gun violence.
On the Jan. 6 insurrection issue, the opposite could happen. Congress could overreact to a long-ago event that many Americans do not see as a continuing national crisis. Two thirds of Americans accept the outcome of the 2020 election as legitimate.
Both reactions can be traced to the same cause: extreme partisanship.
Opposition to gun controls has become a defining issue for Republicans. Rep. Chris Jacobs (R-N.Y.) was pressured by his fellow Republicans into dropping his re-election campaign because he supports an assault weapons ban.
If you want to run for office as a Republican, you are expected to endorse the view that the 2020 election was fraudulent, that Donald Trump was the real winner and that the violent insurrection of Jan. 6, 2021, was not a threat to democracy but a legitimate political protest. To most voters, however, Jan. 6 is not a high priority. The issue is resolved: Joe Biden is president.
The United States enjoyed peaceful transitions of power for over 225 years — until 2020, when Trump claimed to be the victim of a stolen election. He called his supporters to Washington on Jan. 6, 2021, to protest the ceremonial confirmation of the electoral vote result. “Be there, will be wild!” Trump promised his followers.
Hundreds came and stormed Congress, following Trump’s direction to “Stop the Steal.” The House investigating committee called it a “coup attempt.” One week before his term expired, President Trump was impeached for “incitement of insurrection.” The Senate voted 57 to 43 to convict Trump, ten votes short of the two-thirds majority required by the Constitution.
Last week’s congressional hearing felt like the third impeachment trial of Donald Trump. Of course, Trump is no longer president. He can’t be removed from office.
The most dramatic outcome of the current investigation would be to uncover evidence that Trump committed a crime. That would make it impossible for him to run for president in 2024, which he gives every indication he is preparing to do.
In the 2020 election, voters rejected Trump but not necessarily Trumpism. Republicans did well in congressional elections, gaining 13 House seats and holding Democrats to a tie in the Senate. Illegal immigration was Trump’s signature issue (“Build the wall”). Trump brought the Radical Right to power, largely by defining a hard conservative line on culture war issues like immigration. How’s this for pure culture war politics? Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) blamed the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting on a “transsexual leftist illegal alien.”
Gun rights have become central to conservative identity politics. Mark Joslyn and his colleagues at the University of Kansas have found that “the correlation between owning a gun and presidential vote choice increased markedly from 1972 to 2012.”
In his address to the nation on June 2, President Biden called for tough measures to curb gun violence: banning assault weapons and high capacity magazines; expanding background checks for gun buyers; removing legal immunity for gun manufacturers; requiring safe storage of firearms.
While the House has approved most of those measures, they are unlikely to get through the Senate because of the filibuster. A bipartisan group of senators is working on a far weaker compromise deal on guns. Biden’s role in the Senate negotiations? “He’s irrelevant,” a Senate Republican aide told the Washington Post. The president of the United States is called irrelevant!
Why are conservatives so attracted to guns? The answer appears to be ideological. Many in the Radical Right see guns as their ultimate defense against a tyrannical and abusive federal government. The question came up some years ago when I appeared on an Australian television show called “Planet America,” a title that captures the alien nature of the U.S. to non-Americans. I explained that guns represent individual freedom — something Americans value more than any other people in the world. If you are forced to give up your gun, you become less free.
I have been to gun shows and talked to gun owners. Often, they defend gun ownership as the ultimate guarantee of individual rights. Some of them told me, “If Jews in Europe had had guns, there would have been no Holocaust.” The idea that guns are the ultimate guarantee of liberty, I explained to my Australian hosts, is a uniquely American notion.
Total devotion to individual freedom is a marker for the Radical Right. Donald Trump brought them to power, and they are determined to get it back — if not with Trump, then with someone who has Trump’s conservative culture war values but not his ugly personal baggage. Trumpism without Trump.
Bill Schneider is an emeritus professor at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University and author of “Standoff: How America Became Ungovernable” (Simon & Schuster).
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GOP governor says Trump is 'politically, morally responsible' for Jan. 6
Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) on Sunday said former President Trump is “politically, morally responsible” for the Jan. 6 riot last year and called for Republicans to do some “soul-searching” after the attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Hutchinson told “Fox News Sunday” guest host Brett Baier that while he did not believe Trump was criminally responsible for Jan. 6, he does think the former president shares blame for the insurrection.
“Trump is politically, morally responsible for much of what has happened, but in terms of criminal liability, I think the committee has a long way to go to establish that,” the governor said of the House select panel investigating Jan. 6.
The panel held its first June public hearing last week with a plan to hold three more this week. Taken together, lawmakers on the committee say the hearings will show Trump was at the center of the Jan. 6 uprising and culpable for the storming of the U.S. Capitol to overturn certification of the 2020 election.
Republicans who have spoken out against Trump in opposition to election fraud in 2020 or against Jan. 6 have so far drawn his ire, including Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) who is the vice chair of the committee. She was stripped of her congressional leadership post as a result.
The Arkansas governor said Jan. 6 was a “costly error” for democracy and called for the Republican party to try and understand what happened that day and learn from it.
“Republicans need to do a lot of soul searching as to what is the right thing here and what is the right thing for our democracy in the future,” Hutchinson said, “and not simply adhere to the basic instincts of some of our base.”
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Will space suits delay NASA’s return to the moon until 2026?
The news that NASA has contracted two companies, Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace, to provide spacesuit services was quite welcome. The planned Artemis Program return to the moon would be pointless unless astronauts are able to get outside their spacecraft and walk around, doing useful work. Even if America were not leading much of the world to go back to the moon, new extra-vehicular activity (EVA) suits are long overdue.
Recently, according to Space.com, NASA had to suspend spacewalks on the International Space Station (ISS) when water started leaking into the helmet of European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Matthias Maurer. The incident was the second time a helmet started leaking water. The first time occurred in 2013 when ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano came close to drowning when he was working outside the ISS.
In 2019, NASA had to postpone an all-woman spacewalk when the space agency discovered that it did not have any space suits on the ISS that fit the smaller-framed woman astronauts.
The EVA suits that NASA has been using for about 40 years are long overdue for a replacement. The current suits cost a great deal of money and effort to properly maintain.
The Apollo moon suits were a marvel of technology for their time. They afforded the moonwalkers excellent protection during their sojourns on the lunar surface. But the suits were bulky and allowed very limited mobility.
Lunar dust provided an even greater problem for the first men who walked on the moon, according to Space.com. The dust was abrasive and got into everything. It smelled like “burnt charcoal” and posed a health hazard to the Apollo astronauts once they returned to the lunar module with their soiled moon suits.
NASA has been attempting to develop a new EVA suit for the past 15 years without success. However, with the need for a new suit becoming critical, the space agency is turning to the commercial sector for the next generation of EVA suit.
According to Ars Technica, NASA is using the same model of fixed-price contracting that has proven successful for the Commercial Crew and is being used for the Human Landing System programs. Collins Aerospace, a legacy company that was involved in developing the Apollo moon suits, and Axiom Space, a young, entrepreneurial upstart, have been granted $3.5 billion to develop the new EVA suits and then lease them to NASA for both ISS and Artemis astronauts.
Both companies will also offer the same service to commercial customers. Axiom is already developing a private space station where such suits would be of great use.
Axiom and Collins have a great task ahead of them, despite using the data NASA garnered with its own space suit effort. They believe that they will have a space suit ready to field test, likely on an ISS spacewalk, by 2025.
NASA plans to launch the Artemis III mission, the one that will land astronauts on the moon, by 2025 also. One cannot escape the impression that things are being cut a little close. If the spacesuit development process slips, then it may delay the next moon landing by another year, to 2026, even if the Space Launch System and the SpaceX Starship Human Landing System are ready, timing that has been called “aspirational.”
For those who have been waiting for humans to walk on the moon since the last time it happened 50 years ago, another delay would be maddening. On the other hand, at least this time the delay would be due to the challenges of developing new technology and not the capricious decisions of politicians.
On the other hand, 2026 will be the semi-quincentennial or 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the event that started the United States of America as an independent nation. Imagine the Space Launch System blasting off with an Orion spaceship bearing the first astronauts to the moon and the Starship Human Landing System launching — it would be the ultimate fireworks display, heralding the United States’ return as a deep-space power. What a way to mark the anniversary and to demonstrate America’s eternal ability to renew itself.
Mark R. Whittington is the author of space exploration studies “Why is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon?” as well as “The Moon, Mars and Beyond,” and “Why is America Going Back to the Moon?” He blogs at Curmudgeons Corner.
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The Memo: Jan. 6 hearings open new front in battle to control political agenda
A new battle has broken out in Washington, this time over control of the political agenda.
The first public hearing of the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection, held on Thursday evening, put Republicans on defense for the first time in months.
The hearing offered vivid reminders of a dark day in American democracy — and of former President Trump’s role in inciting it.
The panel promises to deliver more damning details about Trump’s involvement in a series of further proceedings beginning Monday.
The committee’s big moment — watched by roughly 20 million people — also landed on political terrain that is enormously unfavorable for Democrats, however. President Biden’s party is seeking to defend meager majorities in both houses of Congress this November.
Within 24 hours, the dramatic hearing had been supplanted at the top of several major news organization’s websites by a fresh barrage of grim economic news.
On Friday morning, new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed inflation climbing to 8.6 percent, the highest figure since the early 1980s.
By the end of the day, the three major stock indices — the Dow Jones, S&P 500 and Nasdaq — had each declined between 2.7 and 3.5 percentage points. The New York Times noted that the broad-based S&P has declined during nine of the last 10 weeks.
As if all that were not enough, gas prices are continuing to rise, with the national average per gallon on the cusp of hitting $5. According to AAA, the national average stood at $4.98 on Friday.
The overall effect is of a split-screen — on one side, a replay of the chaos of Jan. 6, on the other a mosaic of economic pain.
Republicans, including those well outside the party’s MAGA wing, insist the economic side of the picture is much more important from an electoral standpoint.
GOP strategist Alex Conant acknowledged that the Jan. 6 inquiry “is important for history and for holding people accountable.”
But “pocketbook issues almost always drive voting behavior,” he added. “In a time with historic inflation and dropping consumer confidence, the economy is going to be the number one issues voters care about, barring a national security crisis.”
Many Democrats argue that this is simply not the point.
Jan. 6 was such a threat to American democracy, they say, that investigating it simply has to be a priority — not just in terms of assigning culpability but in trying to protect the nation against ever suffering such a crisis again.
“If we don’t get justice, then we can’t guarantee our democracy,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told Chuck Todd on “Meet the Press NOW” Friday.
Democratic strategist Jim Manley told this column he was reluctant even to get into a discussion of the political ramifications of the Jan. 6 committee’s work.
“I don’t claim to know how it’s going to play out but it was the right thing to do,” Manley said. “All I know is that the former president and his team need to be held accountable, and the rest is going to take care of itself.”
Even so, one obvious challenge for the Jan. 6 committee — which includes two anti-Trump Republicans, Reps. Liz Cheney (Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (Ill.), alongside seven Democrats — is keeping the public’s attention.
The massive TV audience for the first hearing was evidence of acute public interest — but it was also helped along hugely by prime-time scheduling and the willingness of the major broadcast networks to preempt their regular programming in order to carry it. Monday’s hearing, which takes place during the day, will not have the same advantages.
Opinion polls show a predictable partisan split on the merits of the committee’s work.
Republican insiders argue the hearings will ultimately become little more than background noise — and could be seen as a distraction from the economic issues that are felt far more viscerally be voters.
President Biden, mindful of this danger, has been low-key about the panel’s work so far. His aides seem more focused on pushing a positive economic message that stresses the prodigious job growth during his tenure.
Some Democrats argue that the Jan. 6 committee has left enough loose ends dangling from its initial hearing to interest the public for the longer haul.
Democratic strategist Mark Longabaugh cited intriguing details on issues like GOP members of Congress allegedly seeking pardons from the outgoing president.
But even Longabaugh acknowledged that the renewed focus on Jan. 6 would have a modest rather than seismic impact on the political landscape.
“Clearly the Republicans were thrown back on their heels — despite their puffed-out chests and bravado,” he said. “But I also don’t want to take it too far in a political context. I think Democrats still face big headwinds, whether it’s inflation, the economy or Biden’s ratings. I don’t think this is going to upend the elections.”
That’s just fine with the GOP.
In a Friday afternoon email to reporters, the Republican National Committee’s recap of the week emphasized inflation, gas prices, an alleged attempt to kill conservative Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, voter enthusiasm among Republicans and the relative rarity with which Biden gives media interviews.
The big inquiry into the attack on the Capitol did not merit a mention.
The Memo is a reported column by Niall Stanage.
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Over 9M qualify for student loan forgiveness program, report finds: Are you eligible?
(NEXSTAR) – Over nine million Americans may qualify for federal student loan forgiveness under a program that’s already in place, according to a new estimate.
The Student Borrower Protection Center released a new report on Thursday that reviewed governmental data and found millions of public service workers likely qualify for debt cancellation through the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, but have yet to file the paperwork to start the process.
The Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, or PSLF, was created in 2007 with the intention of helping employees with nonprofit and government agencies have their student loans forgiven after ten years of payments (120 total payments). The overall approval rate among applicants has been low – just 1 in 5 of the 1.3 million borrowers pursuing debt discharge through PSLF were on track to see relief by 2026, according to a September 2021 report from The Washington Post.
In 2021, the U.S. Department of Education announced a change that temporarily waives certain PSLF requirements to grant borrowers credit toward loan cancellation regardless of their federal loan type or if they had been enrolled in a specific payment plan. This waiver is currently set to expire after October 31, 2022.
As of early May 2022, the Federal Student Aid office reports only about 127,000 borrowers have qualified for forgiveness under the PSLF limited waiver.
Of the nine million public service workers SBPC believes are eligible for forgiveness under PSLF, fewer than 15% have even filed paperwork to track their progress toward debt cancellation. California, Texas, Florida, and New York have the most public service workers with student loan debt, according to SBPC.
The Department of Education has not yet responded to Nexstar’s request for comment regarding SBPC’s report.
What to know about qualifying for PSLF
As explained above, PSLF is intended to give eligible public service employees debt forgiveness after a set number of payments are made.
Eligible borrowers must:
- Be employed by a U.S. federal, state, local, or tribal government or not-for-profit organization (federal service includes U.S. military service)
- Work full-time for that agency or organization
- Have Direct Loans (or consolidate other federal student loans into a Direct Loan)
- Make 120 qualifying payments
Under the current PSLF waiver, eligible borrowers can receive credit for payments made on other loan types, under any payment plan, before consolidation, or after the due date. Those who received Teacher Loan Forgiveness can apply the period of service that led to their eligibility toward PSLF, if they can certify PSLF employment for that period.
How to determine if you qualify
The first step of determining your eligibility is visiting the FSA’s website and logging into your account. You’ll be able to search your employer within the FSA’s database and add information about your employment. Once you find your employer, you’ll be able to see whether it qualifies under PSLF.
Next, according to SBPC’s walkthrough guide, you’ll want to determine which type of federal student loans you have. Direct Loans are eligible for PSLF while other loans need to be consolidated into a Direct Consolidation Loan. Until the end of October 2022, previous qualifying payments you’ve made on a non-Direct Loan will count for the necessary 120 payments PSLF requires for forgiveness.
Once you’ve completed the steps above, you’ll need to confirm your employment. You should then be able to submit your PSLF form.
The FSA has created a help tool to guide borrowers through completing the form.
Who qualifies for the already-approved student loan forgiveness?
While widespread student loan forgiveness hasn’t yet become a reality, some U.S. borrowers have already received some debt relief. Roughly 1.3 million borrowers have seen $25 billion in student debt forgiveness since President Biden took office.
So far, thousands of borrowers have received $6.8 billion in debt cancellation “through improvements to PSLF,” according to the Education Department. Another roughly 690,000 borrowers have had a total of $7.9 billion in student loans canceled through discharges due to borrower defense and school closures. Over 400,000 borrowers have received more than $8.5 billion in debt forgiveness through total and permanent disability discharge.
Biden will likely announce his plans regarding more widespread student debt forgiveness in July or August, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday.
WXIN’s Matt Adams contributed to this report.
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Coons says US at risk for 'season of political violence' after Jan. 6
Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) on Sunday said the U.S. is at risk for a “season of political violence” in part due to the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
Coons told “Fox News Sunday” guest host Brett Baier that Americans need to “reduce the level of our rhetoric” or the nation will face more political violence.
“We are at risk of a season of political violence in this country, and all of us should reduce the temper and level of our rhetoric,” Coons said. “Be mindful of the fact that stirring up political violence is not a good or constructive thing.”
The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot opened its first June public hearing on Thursday, in which it laid out evidence of former President Trump’s involvement. A mob of pro-Trump supporters stormed the Capitol that day to protest Congress’ formal counting of Electoral College votes that affirmed President Biden’s win.
Trump had spent months falsely claiming his defeat was “rigged.”
Coons said Americans need to take a “hard and clear-eyed look at what happened on January 6th” to understand where the nation could be headed in a polarized future if nothing changes.
“We’ve never had our capitol stormed by Americans,” Coons said. “We’ve never had an attempt through an insurrection, through a riot, to interrupt the peaceful transfer of power.”
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Democrats could be on pace for a historic rout in November
Three recent developments indicate that Democrats’ already shaky political prospects are deteriorating further, and suggest that the party could be on track to experience a historic rout — worse than 1994 or 2010 — in the midterm elections.
First, the president’s approval rating — which has historically been a harbinger of his party’s midterm performance — hit a new low this week: just one-third (35 percent) of registered voters approve of President Biden’s overall performance, while a majority (56 percent) disapprove, according to Quinnipiac polling.
Importantly, Democrats have lost ground with two key segments of their 2020 coalition — Independents and Hispanics — as only one-quarter of adults in each group approve of President Biden, while majorities disapprove.
Republicans also have an advantage in terms of preference for party control of Congress. Nearly one-half (46 percent) of registered voters prefer Republican control, while 41 percent prefer Democratic control. G.O.P. control is also preferred by Independents (40 percent-38 percent) and Hispanics (41 percent-38 percent).
To be sure, Democrats’ declining ratings can be attributed in large part to widespread economic pessimism, which is on par with 2009 levels by most assessments.
Relatedly, the second development that bodes poorly for Democrats in November is the release of fresh economic data: inflation has hit a 41-year-high of 8.6 percent annually, the average price for a gallon of gas is $5, and the stock market is tanking. Now, many economists are warning of an impending recession.
Of course, the stock market is not the economy and, notwithstanding inflationary pressures, the American economy is in fact strong in many respects, which President Biden has repeatedly tried to underscore to the public.
But despite the administration’s best efforts to highlight positive macroeconomic trends — such as increased wages and historically low unemployment — everyday Americans, who are witnessing significant market declines and struggling with rising costs, are not convinced.
Indeed, President Biden’s approval rating on his handling of the economy reached the lowest level of his presidency this week: only 28 percent of Americans approve of President Biden’s handling of the economy, including just one-fifth of Independents (21 percent) and Hispanics (20 percent).
While Democrats are working to shift the national conversation away from the economy and towards hot-button social issues that they have the upper hand on vis-à-vis public opinion — namely, abortion rights in light of the Supreme Court’s intention to overturn Roe v. Wade, and gun control following a string of mass shootings — it is difficult to envision a scenario where these issues supplant the economy as the top midterm issue.
Nearly one-half (48 percent) of Americans cite economic issues — including inflation (21 percent), the economy generally (19 percent) and gas prices (8 percent) — as the single most important issue to their midterm vote, according to recent ABC News polling.
Comparatively, the same poll — which was conducted following the mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde, and thus after the news broke about Roe v. Wade — showed that gun violence (17 percent) and abortion (12 percent) are prioritized by a much smaller share of voters.
Though Democrats are hoping that the national focus on women’s choice and gun control will help the party galvanize their base and make up ground in the midterms, polling unfortunately doesn’t bear that out. Republicans currently maintain a 12-point voter enthusiasm advantage over Democrats, 43 percent to 31 percent, per a recent Economist/YouGov poll.
Moreover, though the Democratic stance on gun control is more aligned with the general public’s views, the renewed national focus on gun violence could end up hurting Democrats in the midterms, given the party’s electoral vulnerabilities on the issue of crime.
While polling consistently shows that most voters are supportive of stricter gun laws, there is prevalent public concern about rising crime as well as broad dissatisfaction with President Biden’s and Democrats’ handling of crime, and even more specifically, of gun violence.
Only 38 percent of Americans approve of the president’s handling of rising crime, while a majority (61 percent) disapprove. Further, just one-third (33 percent) of the public approves of how President Biden is addressing gun violence, versus 59 percent who disapprove.
This widespread discontent with Democrats’ approach to crime brings us to the third key development of the week: the results of California’s primary elections held Tuesday, which saw a decisive rejection of progressive policies — especially on criminal justice — in one of the most liberal states in the country.
The recall of San Francisco’s progressive District Attorney, Chesa Boudin, was the strongest rebuke of progressive crime policies to date and underscores the challenges Democrats face with messaging on this issue going forward.
The results of the Los Angeles mayoral primary are also somewhat troubling for Democrats. Democratic Rep. Karen Bass and billionaire real estate developer Rick Caruso, who was formerly a Republican, finished neck-and-neck, and are headed to a runoff election.
Though Bass has worked to moderate her positioning on crime by calling for a greater police presence in the city, Caruso’s stance runs decisively to the right of Bass’. The closeness of this race ultimately indicates that Democrats will have a difficult time reframing the public narrative — which ties their policies to rising crime rates — ahead of the midterms, despite President Biden’s efforts to vocalize the Democratic establishment’s opposition to the defund the police movement.
Taken together, the American public’s growing dissatisfaction with the Biden administration, increasing economic pessimism, and rejection of progressivism indicate that the Democratic Party could be on track to endure one of the most considerable midterm seat losses of any part in recent history.
Douglas E. Schoen is a political consultant who served as an adviser to former President Clinton and to the 2020 presidential campaign of Michael Bloomberg. He is the author of “The End of Democracy? Russia and China on the Rise and America in Retreat.” Zoe Young is vice president of Schoen Cooperman Research.
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Rebranded former McDonald's outlets open in Russia
Russian owners unveiled several rebranded former McDonald’s restaurants in Moscow on Sunday, part of an effort to convert all 850 locations into a new brand after the international fast-food chain pulled its business out of the country in March.
The former McDonald’s restaurants are now called Vkusno & tochka, which translates as “Tasty and that’s it,” and sport a new logo inspired by the fast-food chain: two potato fries hanging over a burger bun, according to the Russian news agency TASS.
Around 200 of the former McDonald’s restaurants will re-open under the new name and logo by the end of June, with all 850 locations set to re-open under the new branding by the end of the summer, Reuters noted.
McDonald’s first opened in Russia in 1990 following the collapse of the communist Soviet Union, serving as a symbol for Russia’s re-emergence into the international market and world.
But McDonald’s closed its stores in March, joining dozens of international companies in pulling business and services out of Russia after it invaded Ukraine in late February.
The fast-food giant eventually sold its restaurants to businessman and former franchise operator Alexander Govo, who then re-opened the shuttered stores with Vkusno & tochka CEO Oleg Paroev.
The rebranded stores can no longer sell the Big Mac, the McFlurry or the McChicken, but Paroev said at a news conference the goal is that customers don’t “notice a difference” in the taste, according to Reuters.
A new slogan for the company reads: “The name changes, love stays.”
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Senate poised to pass bill helping soldiers exposed to toxic substances
Sgt. First Class Heath Robinson deployed to Iraq and Kosovo with the Ohio National Guard, but the battle didn’t end when he returned home.
After returning to Ohio, Robinson experienced gushy nosebleeds and bleeding from his ear caused by a rare autoimmune disease.
In 2017, he was diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer that his oncologist said only could’ve been caused by prolonged toxic exposure.
Despite these health issues, Robinson’s family was unable to get caregiver benefits from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs (VA) because they couldn’t prove that his illness was caused by his military service.
Robinson’s mother-in-law, Susan Zeier, stood alongside lawmakers and advocates at a press event in Washington this past week and explained the tiring ordeal of taking care of Heath before he died of his cancer in 2020. Robinson’s ailments included spontaneous vomiting while his nose bleeds, all of which made it difficult for him to breathe.
“Needless to say, Heath spent his final three years battling the war that followed him home,” Zeier said. “He told us that he is a soldier and soldiers don’t know how to give up.”
Two years after Robinson’s death, Congress is poised to pass legislation in his honor to help millions of veterans like him.
The Senate is set to vote this week on the Sgt. First Class Heath Robinson Honoring our PACT Act to expand healthcare and other benefits for a new generation of veterans who were exposed to toxic chemicals. The bill would largely benefit those who served after 9/11 and were exposed to toxic substances during that time.
Advocates are hailing it as a major step for helping these individuals, but some say more needs to be done to address past and ongoing exposures to toxic substances in the military.
“It’s a huge deal, particularly for…the post-9/11 wounded, ill and injured,” said Aleks Morosky, government affairs deputy director at the Wounded Warrior Project.
“Every generation of veterans unfortunately has had some kind of exposure issue,” Morosky added. “There has not yet been any sort of comprehensive legislation passed to address that for the post-9/11 generation.”
The bill, which passed a procedural vote in the Senate in an 86-12 vote last week, would expand eligibility for Veterans Affairs health care for post-9/11 combat veterans, including those exposed to toxic chemicals.
A version of the bill has also passed the House in a 256-174 vote, but the Senate version differs slightly so it will need to be approved by the House again if the Senate approves it. President Biden is expected to sign the legislation if it reaches his desk.
The legislation would also add 23 conditions related to burn pit and toxic exposures to the VA’s list of service presumptions — meaning that veterans who have these conditions will not need to prove that they are connected to their service in order to make claims for disability payments.
It also would create a framework for creating future presumptions, that includes allowing the public to weigh in on proposed presumptions.
It would not cover newer veterans, though the measure does expand eligibility for veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange, a pesticide that the military used during the Vietnam War. Agent Orange has been linked to bladder cancer, hypothyroidism and Parkinson’s Disease.
Shane Liermann, deputy national legislative director at the advocacy group Disabled American Veterans, praised the bill while saying that more can be done.
“This is a great first step, this really is, because it’s going to put some onus on the VA to make sure things are getting addressed in order for them to be considered a presumptive disease,” Liermann said.
But, he said the legislation could go even further, and that there should be specific timeline requirements for the VA to act on exposure presumptions.
Many of the toxic exposures impacting soldiers who returned from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are related to burn pits — large heaps of trash that are set on fire to dispose of the military’s waste.
Exposure to these pits has been linked to asthma, sinusitis, and rare forms of cancers. But it can take years for the conditions to develop.
Biden has connected burn pit exposure to the 2015 death of his son Beau from brain cancer.
Veteran Andrew Myatt, who has leukemia, told The Hill that he believes his own illness was caused by burn pit exposure in Iraq.
He said that he personally does not expect to benefit from the legislation because he has good insurance from his current job, but he believes it would help others.
“I had five bone marrow biopsies, eight spinal taps, ten transfusions…three years of multiple types of chemo,” Myatt said. “The amount of stuff they put you through to try to combat this is not cheap in any way shape or form. If I didn’t have good health care and survived, I would be in debt for the rest of my life.”
While the use of burn pits is no longer widespread, military personnel are exposed to other toxins such as cancer-linked per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).
Uses for PFAS, also known as forever chemicals because they don’t break down over time in the environment or human body, include military firefighting foam, though this is expected to be phased out by October 2024.
Defense Department spokesperson Peter Hughes said via email that the Pentagon “continues its work toward a replacement for firefighting foam containing PFAS” and in the meantime has been switching to formulations that contain lower quantities of the substances. He added that it’s only used in emergencies unless it can be completely contained.
Scott Faber, senior vice president of government affairs at the Environmental Working Group, said that while he’s pleased to see Congress taking action to help past victims of toxic exposures, both Congress and the military need to do more to prevent them from happening and clean them up.
“I wish there was as much bipartisan support for protecting service members from the ongoing risks posed by toxic chemicals …as there is for ensuring that servicemembers get the health care they deserve,” he said.
Meanwhile, Hughes said that the department “remains committed to the health and safety of our Service Members, their families, the DoD Civilian Workforce, and the communities in which the DoD serves” and spends about $1.5B on cleanup annually.
Source: TEST FEED1