Boozman speaks during a press conference today.

PRESS RELEASE

WASHINGTON – As the crisis on the southern border continues and the Biden administration moves to escalate it by rescinding Title 42, U.S. Senator John Boozman (R-AR) warned President Biden that he and his colleagues will not stand by and allow Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) resources and personnel to be saddled with responding to the influx of illegal immigrants at the expense of those who served our nation.

Boozman joined his Senate Republican colleagues at a press conference at the U.S. Capitol to discuss the consequences of the administration’s plan to lift the Trump-era Title 42 order. The senator, who serves as the lead Senate Republican appropriator for VA funding and is a senior member of the Veterans’ Affairs Committee, said distracting the VA from providing care for the men and women who fought for our country is wrong, particularly at a time when the Department is facing staffing shortages that already limit access to services and treatment for veterans.

“America’s veterans have given everything for this country. We can’t let the resources and personnel that are supposed to be dedicated to taking care of them get ripped away because the president and his administration have so badly mismanaged our border security and illegal immigration problem,” Boozman said during the press conference. “They don’t deserve it and we won’t stand for it.”

Boozman has been leading the Senate response to reports, which Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas confirmed today, that the Biden administration is considering diverting VA manpower or funding as part of the increased federal response that will be required if the Title 42 order is rescinded.

He introduced legislation to block the administration from such a move and previously led a group of his colleagues in sending a letter to President Biden laying out the current staffing shortfalls in the VA health system and demanding he commit to preventing VA personnel from being utilized to confront the expected surge at the southern border as a result of ending Title 42.