Veteran Affairs (VA) Secretary David Shulkin on Monday said he does not consider the former Air Force service member identified as the gunman in a Texas mass shooting as a veteran, and that he would not have had access to mental health help from the department.
“I do not consider him a veteran. That would give him much more respect than he deserves,” Shulkin said of Devin Kelley, whom law enforcement identified as the gunman in a church shooting Sunday in Sutherland Springs, Texas.
Kelley had served in the Air Force in Logistics Readiness at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico beginning in 2010, but was court-martialed in 2012 for an assault on his then-wife and child. He was sentenced to 12 months confinement, received a reduction in rank and was discharged in 2014 for “bad conduct,” according to the Air Force.
“He is a criminal and I think that he was convicted and with a dishonorable discharge does not deserve to have the same title as the men and women who have served this country and have honorably been discharged,” Shulkin said during remarks at the National Press Club in Washington.
Authorities say Kelley killed 26 churchgoers and injured and at least 20 others when he opened fire outside and inside the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, a small town about 30 miles east of San Antonio.
Kelley reportedly used a military-style Ruger AR-556 rifle in the shooting and killed himself after fleeing the scene.
Shulkin said there is a distinction between those who have received an other than honorable discharge and those who have received a dishonorable discharge. Those with the former, he said, “we do believe are in need of our assistance and help, particularly with mental illness.”
“Those dishonorable discharged have violated the law, have violated our morals and ethics, and I do not believe deserve the types of services and benefits and VA would not be providing those benefits,” Shulkin explained.
“This is not a person who has ever been treated in the VA system and would not be eligible for those benefits,” he said.
President Trump said after the shooting that the issue was a mental health issue and not “a guns situation.”
Shulkin said, however, that officials don’t “know enough about [Kelley’s] state of mind to give him a diagnoses.”
“Unfortunately, in this world there are people that are evil and there are people that are criminal and you don’t always know the reason why, but I certainly believe that he was an evil person,” Shulkin said.
Shulkin was also asked whether the VA system needs to change to accommodate those in need of help, including Kelley and Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl — who received a dishonorable discharge and loss of military benefits last week for walking off his post in Afghanistan in 2009.
In response, he said such individuals would not be eligible for VA benefits.
“I believe there’s a very small segment — two individuals that we’re talking about today — that have violated basic legal and moral and ethical behaviors, that we do not owe those same rights to.”
Shulkin added: “They have other systems that I believe that they could get the help that they need in, whether they are prison systems or other community-based systems but not the Department of Veteran Affairs.”