Accountability for Military Veterans Receiving Benefits

American Service Personnel are required to swear an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States. Frequently, this oath is often held strongly while in service, but later, when retired, the oath is treated as though it were flippant. In some cases, an ex-service member is endeavoring to undertake actions that are treasonous. When this happens, the service branches are paying their enemies to conspire against them. This is unacceptable.

The current VA policy for Veterans reads thus:

Applying for Benefits and Your Character of Discharge

Generally, to receive VA benefits and services, the Veteran’s character of discharge or service must be under other than dishonorable conditions (e.g., honorable, under honorable conditions, general).

However, individuals receiving undesirable, bad conduct, and other than honorable discharges may qualify for VA benefits depending on a determination made by VA.

We issued a final rule amending our regulations regarding character of discharge determinations, expanding access to VA care and benefits for some former service members discharged under other than honorable conditions or by special court-martial.

The final rule is effective as of June 25, 2024.

The new regulation expands access to care and benefits for certain former service members by:

Eliminating the regulatory bar for “homosexual acts involving aggravating circumstances or other factors affecting the performance of duty” as a bar to benefits.
Creating a “compelling circumstances exception” for certain former service members.
Opening the door for previously denied service members to reapply for benefits.
Our character of discharge determination does not change the Armed Forces’ characterization of service and has no effect on the former Service member’s military discharge status. Our determination is for VA benefits and services eligibility purposes only.

We encourage former service members with other than honorable and bad conduct discharges to apply for VA care and benefits today. We will carefully consider the circumstances of your discharge and determine if you are eligible.

source: Applying for Benefits and Your Character of Discharge - Veterans Benefits Administration

The distinction here, is that the discharge determines the benefits, and is only made once. Contrast this with other benefits such as food stamps, where a person must, every so often, check in to continue to receive the benefit.

The suggestion is to establish a review board for veterans receiving benefits as their oath does not end at the termination of their service period. If the veteran in question is found to be engaging in treasonous activities, cut their benefits off and move them to dishonorable discharge status indefinitely.

The benefit to this policy is twofold:

  1. It keeps service members accountable and calls them to recall their commitments. (It also allows the military to keep a check on its members and their welfare)

  2. It stops the US from spending money on people who want to wish it harm.

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I would also like to add, that benefits are only given to Active military, I was a Air national guard member, for 3 1/2 years I was in a bad car accident that ended my military career before my enlistment was up, with that being said I was in from 1975 - 1978, my unit never was deployed or I was never about to get the 180 days active duty time to qualify for any VA benefits, I would like to see that dropped and any person who joins any branch of the military automatically become eligible for VA benefits if on discharge they have an honorable, if someone willing to put there name on the dotted for the country should be treated the same as any other branches are, we have seen the past few years national guard units being deployed more often to combat areas for support, my understanding is the national guard was developed as extra support unit. Yet if some never got deployed then not benefits.

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I am sorry to hear about your accident, but yes, honorable discharge should be across the board.

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