Blumenthal, King Call on VA's Office of Inspector General to Investigate Trump VA's Chaotic Contract Cancellations

[WASHINGTON, DC] – U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Ranking Member of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, and U.S. Senator Angus King are calling on the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Inspector General to launch an investigation into the Trump Administration’s ongoing cancellation of VA contracts, which began earlier this year. Despite multiple requests from Blumenthal, King, and Congressional Democrats, VA Secretary Doug Collins refuses to send Congress the complete and updated list of VA contracts canceled or proposed for cancellation.

“We write to request the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Inspector General (OIG) initiate a review of the mass cancellation of VA contracts launched by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Secretary Collins, and other officials of the Department and the impact of these actions on veterans and VA operations. These activities began soon after January 20 and are ongoing,” wrote the Senators in a letter to Acting Inspector General David Case.

The Senators continued, “Since February of this year, Committee Minority staff have investigated these activities using public government contracting databases, internal VA documents, conducting interviews with VA employees and contractors, and other methods. The preliminary findings after analyzing more than 650 VA contracts ‘terminated for convenience’ between January 20 and May 30, 2025, extracted from federal contracting databases, are that a majority appear to be for services directly for veterans or critical VA operations to include for safe health care delivery.” While Collins and VA officials have refused to turn over the complete and updated list of contracts canceled, contract data is available online in near real time—including information on the cancellation of VA contracts.

The Senators pointed to damning reporting from ProPublica exposing the careless nature of Secretary Collins and DOGE’s contract cancellation process at VA, including using flawed, error-prone AI tools to determine what contracts would be canceled: “To add to these alarming facts, recent media investigations, to include two stories released by ProPublica on June 6, have found evidence that DOGE and VA officials used ill-conceived Artificial Intelligence (AI) formulas and algorithms to make or inform contract cancellation decisions—cutting out meaningful input from VA career experts to assess the impact of ending these services. This adds an entire new level of unease connected to the decision-making, security, governance, and quality control of the entire process.”

The Senators concluded by citing these findings and information as rationale for VA OIG to conduct a review of VA’s ongoing contract cancellations: “…[T]his process, which included cancelling hundreds of contracts, many in a several-day period, then restoring dozens just a few days later, is not an indication of good program management but rather waste, carelessness, and chaos. We are deeply concerned about how these cancellations, which are ongoing, are or will impact veterans’ health care, benefits, and other services; harm VA’s ability to perform oversight and program improvement; and eliminate or significantly hinder the availability of critical tools to maintain safe and clean facilities. A non-partisan and independent review of these matters is critical.”

Blumenthal and King’s request comes at the heels of a spotlight forum they held earlier this month with employees whose companies had a VA contract cancelled by DOGE, an expert in cancer registries – which are among the canceled VA contracts – and an expert in federal contracting oversight and transparency. During the forum, witnesses revealed the sudden cancellation of their companies’ contracts, without cause, and underscored the harm of the cancellations on veterans. Their testimony directly contradicted VA Secretary Collins and Department officials’ claim that “contracts that directly supported Veterans, beneficiaries or provided services VA cannot do itself…were not canceled.” The spotlight forum witnesses also testified that that the work carried out through their contracts was consistently recognized for high performance by VA and was deemed critical by the VA employees with whom they worked. 

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