In a recent announcement released by the Veterans Affairs Department (VA), the agency claimed that if the government shutdown lasts for a month, it will be forced cut off disability benefits and educational benefit payment, which could have result in financial devastation among recipients.
In the meantime, the Veterans Benefits Administration claims processor will continue to handle disability and education claims while the government is in a shutdown mode. Also, the agency has accepted VBA claim processors so that they can continue to process claims and recipients will still continue to receive their payments amid the shutdown, according to reports.
Unfortunately, those benefits are provided through the appropriated mandatory funding, which will run out by late October if the shutdown continues, claimed by VA spokeswoman Victoria Drillon.
Meanwhile, the VA has assured that it will continue updating its official web page and official Facebook and Twitter accounts intermittently during the shutdown. Also, the contact centers for disability claims will be available, but not the education benefits hotline during the shutdown period. On the other hand, public affairs staff will be furloughed, the reports said. Moreover, the shutdown will also affect burials and cemeteries operated by the VA, which claimed that internments would be “conducted on a modified rate”.
“We have to be hopeful that Congress will reach some sort of comprise before millions of disabled veterans and survivors are financially devastated,” the Department of Foreign Wars (DFW) spokesman, Joe Davis, said.
Also, the American Legion National Commander, Daniel M. Dellinger, said in his appeal to lawmakers that, “Congress has an obligation to put veterans ahead of politics. The fact that funding for VA benefits could disappear in a month ought to be incentive enough for our elected leaders to achieve a solution.”
As it is, millions of American veterans rely for a living, education and medications on federal benefit programs that are feared to come to an end in case the government shutdown pushes through the end of October. Thus, a Los Angeles disability lawyer hopes that the Congress will soon come to a resolution to get the government back in full swing.
