Blumenthal, Senators Demand Trump Administration Explain "Disturbing" Secret Hospital Guideline Changes

[WASHINGTON, DC] – U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Ranking Member of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, today led a group of 26 of his colleagues to demand the Trump Administration’s Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) explain why it changed certain VA Medical Center bylaws in a way that could invite discrimination against veteran patients and health care providers. This follows recent reporting detailing how the Trump Administration secretly changed guidelines in a way that leaves VA providers and patients with ambiguity regarding whether certain protected traits, including their political affiliation or sexual orientation, can serve as reasons for denial of health care for veterans or the hiring of medical professionals.

“We write today to request information regarding recent changes to patient and staff policies governing medical facilities within the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA),” wrote the Senators in a letter to VA Secretary Doug Collins. “Having reviewed past and current versions of bylaws for multiple medical facilities within the Department, we have confirmed the Department made changes, in secret and without notification to the veterans you serve or to Congress, that could allow for discrimination in treating patients and hiring medical professionals.”

The Senators explicitly detailed the difference between the previous version of the bylaws and the new version. Language that previously required VA providers to care for veterans regardless of politics, marital status, age, national origin, and disability has been removed from certain VA health care facilities’ medical bylaws. Language that also previously ensured decisions for who was able to be a part of VA’s medical staff were made without regard to political affiliation, marital status, age, national origin, disability, gender, sexual orientation, and union membership have been removed from certain VA facilities’ medical bylaws.

While the Department has cited President Trump’s discriminatory “Defending Women” Executive Order (EO) as rationale for making these changes, the Senators as asserted that as “a grossly overzealous interpretation of this EO and egregious misuse of power.”

The Senators continued slamming the Administration’s unjustified changes: “While many of the previously specified traits that have been removed from VA facilities’ bylaws potentially remain protected under existing statutes, the message VA is sending by stripping explicit references to these criteria is still deeply disturbing. Allowing, let alone encouraging, this ambiguity opens the door for widespread discrimination. These changes invite uncertainty as to whether a patient can be denied access to their earned health care or whether a provider is considered unfit to serve veterans based on anything other than their expertise and credentials. Even the appearance of allowing discrimination directly violates VA’s own mission…”

The Senators concluded by declaring it Collins’ responsibility as Secretary to explain why this Administration would strip certain anti-discrimination provisions from VA’s bylaws: “It is your duty to answer to veterans, the public, and Congress as to why VA is sowing confusion and potentially putting veterans at risk and jeopardizing the Department’s medical workforce, clinicians’ licensure, and accreditation of its medical facilities nationwide. We insist you publish proper justification and clarification of these changes so as to leave no uncertainty as to the Department’s protections for patients and employees against unlawful and unethical discrimination.”

Blumenthal’s letter was also signed by Democratic leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) and U.S. Senators Patty Murray (D-WA), Bernard Sanders (I-VT), Maggie Hassan (D-NH), Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Angus King (I-ME), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Elissa Slotkin (D-MI), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Adam Schiff (D-CA), Jacky Rosen (D-NV), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Alex Padilla (D-CA), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), Mark Kelly (D-AZ), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Gary Peters (D-MI), Tim Kaine (D-VA), John Fetterman (D-PA), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Angela Alsobrooks (D-MD), and Mark Warner (D-VA).

The full text of the Senators’ letter is available here and below.

Dear Secretary Collins: 

We write today to request information regarding recent changes to patient and staff policies governing medical facilities within the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Having reviewed past and current versions of bylaws for multiple medical facilities within the Department, we have confirmed the Department made changes, in secret and without notification to the veterans you serve or to Congress, that could allow for discrimination in treating patients and hiring medical professionals.

Previous versions of the bylaws outlined specific prohibitions on discrimination against patients “on the basis of race, age, color, sex, religion, national origin, politics, marital status, or disability” (Article III, Section 3.03, paragraph 1). The new version prohibits discrimination only “on the basis of any legally protected status, including legally protected status such as race, color, religion, sex, or prior protected activity.” Additionally, whereas prior versions of bylaws prohibited medical staff hiring decisions based on, among other criteria, national origin, gender, lawful partisan political affiliation, marital status, disability, age, and membership or non-membership in a labor organization (Article III, Section 3.01, paragraph 3), all of these specific criteria have been cut from the new version of the text. The Department, under your leadership, cites only Executive Order (EO) 14168 “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” as reasoning for implementing these bylaw changes. This is a grossly overzealous interpretation of this EO and egregious misuse of power.

While many of the previously specified traits that have been removed from VA facilities’ bylaws potentially remain protected under existing statutes, the message VA is sending by stripping explicit references to these criteria is still deeply disturbing. Allowing, let alone encouraging, this ambiguity opens the door for widespread discrimination. These changes invite uncertainty as to whether a patient can be denied access to their earned health care or whether a provider is considered unfit to serve veterans based on anything other than their expertise and credentials. Even the appearance of allowing discrimination directly violates VA’s own mission: “To fulfill President Lincoln’s promise to care for those who have served in our nation’s military and for their families, caregivers, and survivors.”

These new guidelines are deeply dangerous and pernicious in practice and principle. It is your duty to answer to veterans, the public, and Congress as to why VA is sowing confusion and potentially putting veterans at risk and jeopardizing the Department’s medical workforce, clinicians’ licensure, and accreditation of its medical facilities nationwide. We insist you publish proper justification and clarification of these changes so as to leave no uncertainty as to the Department’s protections for patients and employees against unlawful and unethical discrimination.

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