House and Senate lawmakers are pledging to renew their push for legislation designed to help bolster suicide prevention programs for military veterans in the next Congress.
The bill, known as the Clay Hunt Suicide Prevention for American Veterans Act, passed the House last week but was blocked Monday night by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who balked over the measure’s $22 million price tag and claimed it overlapped existing efforts at the Veterans Affairs Department.
“I’m going to be objecting to this bill because it actually throws money away,” Coburn said on the Senate floor. “We’re the ones to blame for not holding the VA accountable.
“I don’t think this bill is going to do one thing to change what is happening.”
The move infuriated backers of the legislation, which is named after a young Iraq veteran who took his own life.
“Make no mistake, the fight isn’t over,” Rep. Tim Walz (D-Minn.), one of the original sponsors of the bill, said in a statement late Monday night. “We will rally from this setback; I will reintroduce this important legislation immediately in the 114th Congress, and there is no doubt in my mind it will eventually become law.”
Walz, the highest-ranking enlisted soldier in congressional history, noted that according to the VA’s own math, around 8,000 veterans commit suicide every year.
“Each day we fail to address this problem, more veterans die. It’s incredibly disappointing that this commonsense legislation was stymied by the only member of Congress in either the House or Senate who objects to the bill,” he said.
Monday night Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who is slated to be the ranking member on the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee next year, said that, if the bill “fails this time, we will bring it back.”
“As parents who experienced the pain of losing a veteran to suicide, it is shocking to see this bill blocked because of one lone Senator’s agenda,” Susan Selke, Hunt’s mother, said in a statement circulated by the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA).
The group labored for months to get the bill passed, at one point delivering nearly 60,000 signed petitions to the Washington office of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to force a vote on the measure.
“While throughout this process we have been so thankful for the widespread and sincere support from our Congressional leaders, today, once again, vets like my son were failed,” Selke said. “I am grieving thinking of those young men and women who will be delayed receiving help because of this inaction.”
Paul Rieckhoff, IAVA’s CEO and founder, labeled Coburn’s actions “unconscionable.”
“Have no doubt, we will be back with reinforcements when the next Congress arrives,” he said.
The White House said it continued to urge the Senate to pass the legislation, “Sen. Coburn’s objection notwithstanding.”
“This is a critical issue, and the president believes that we owe it to our veterans to do everything we can to give them the support and the resources that they need,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said. “Ensuring that veterans have access to timely and effective mental health care is a top administration priority.”
Earnest said he did not believe that President Obama and Coburn, who struck up a friendship during their time in the Senate, had discussed the legislation.