Removal of U.S. Rep. Chris Smith from the House Veterans Affairs Committee outrages vets.
By: Scott Morgan and William Wichert
A little over one week ago, Bob Yancey felt a slap across his face. Tuesday morning, it was still stinging.
But if you asked them, all the other veterans sitting with Mr. Yancey around this table near the back wall of Florence Veterans of Foreign Wars, Opry-Larsons Post 8838, would tell you they felt the same sting. To these half dozen men, the United States government had committed an egregious sin.
It had put a price tag on their service.
On Jan. 6, Republican leaders in the U.S. Congress announced they would remove U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, R-4th, from the House Veterans Affairs Committee. Prior to being replaced in favor of Indiana congressman and Gulf War vet Steve Buyer, Mr. Smith served on Veterans Affairs Committee for 24 years and was its chairman for the last four.
But lately, Mr. Smith’s chairmanship has been a rocky road. Seen almost unanimously by veterans as their greatest ally in Congress, Mr. Smith has been at increasing odds with members of his party over how to fund veterans’ health-care benefits. An online report published by the veterans advocacy group Disabled American Veterans states that Mr. Smith’s position on the committee was threatened in 2003, and according to the congressional newspaper The Hill, Mr. Smith’s outspoken support of heavily funding veterans programs rankled House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois.
According to The Hill, Mr. Buyer is a loyal supporter of Mr. Hastert. In a press statement, Mr. Buyer acknowledged Mr. Smith’s "legacy of accomplishments" and said that under his stewardship, "the VA will be there to help the disabled and the indigent."
Mr. Smith has been touring tsunami-damaged areas of Southeast Asia since last week and was not available for comment.
John Feehery, a spokesman for Mr. Hastert’s office, said the Steering Committee chose Mr. Buyer based on his war record.
"They wanted to have a veteran to deal with the problems of vets coming back from the Iraq war," Mr. Feehery said, adding that some members of the Steering Committee might have had other reasons for ousting Mr. Smith, though he refused to characterize them.
Last week’s announcement, though arguably foreseeable, still came as a shock .to some local vets who say they only heard their champion was about to go missing after it was too late.
"We never saw it coming," said Perry Bal, a Korean War vet who serves as Burlington County service officer for American Legion Post 146 in Riverside. "I saw it in the papers."
When the word came from Capitol Hill, said Mr. Bal, echoing Mr. Yancey, it was tantamount to a slap in every veteran’s face, regardless of whether that veteran saw combat.
"A vet is a vet," said Mr. Yancey, who fought in World War II, Korea and Vietnam and is commander of the Joint Veterans Alliance of Burlington County. "For every one man on the line, you’ve got 10 (supporting him). They all deserve benefits."
To these men gathered at Roebling’s VFW post Tuesday, the message Congress has sent by ousting Mr. Smith from the Committee on Veterans Affairs is that the House’s new leadership is more interested in politics than the sacrifices of veterans.
Moreover, said World War II Army vet Ernie DelCasino, Congress, following the guiding hand of the Bush administration, is sending a message that if you don’t just fall into line with the party mandate something he said Mr. Smith has proven himself unwilling to do you will be dealt with harshly.
Either way, he said, America’s veterans have lost a close friend.
"Chris Smith was our champion," Mr. DelCasino said. "We need a lot more Smiths."
National Perspective
In Washington, D.C., officials from national veterans groups expressed similar sentiments this week about a man that they considered to be the greatest advocate for veterans in Congress.
"In the House, we don’t have many champions and he was one," said David W. Gorman, executive director of the Washington headquarters of the Disabled American Veterans (DAV). "Smith seems to take that authority and do something with it."
Mr. Smith used that authority as committee chairman to oppose the Bush administration’s proposed funding levels for veterans’ health care over the last three years, calling the president’s recommendations unrealistic and insufficient, he said.
"While the administration has again proposed a substantial increase in the budget for veterans’ affairs, there remains a gap between the level of resources it would provide and that needed to meet unprecedented growth in demand for VA health care," Mr. Smith wrote in a Feb. 28, 2003 letter to the House Committee on the Budget regarding the proposed fiscal year 2004 budget.
After the administration proposed a $500 million increase over the 2003 budget for VA health care, Mr. Smith pushed to finally bring that number up to a $2.5 billion increase, said Dennis Cullinan, director of the VFW’s National Legislative Service.
"He put principles before politics," said Mr. Cullinan. "He didn’t back off, even when the (House) leadership told him to knock it off."
In the last few years, Mr. Smith also helped defeat the Bush administration’s proposal to implement a $250 enrollment fee and higher co-payments for veterans with nonservice-related disabilities in the VA priority levels 7 and 8.
But when the administration submits its fiscal year 2006 budget proposal in the coming weeks, Mr. Cullinan said, there is the distinct possibility that those enrollment fees and higher co-payments may be approved this year, now that Mr. Smith is no longer on the committee.
"He’d based his decisions on the facts at hand," said Mr. Cullinan. "It wasn’t based on an external agenda."
Mr. Gorman said he believes a political agenda may be exactly what guides veterans’ legislation and health care funding down the road. He said Mr. Smith’s removal as chairman is not an isolated incident, but part of a greater overhaul of veterans’ leadership in Washington.
Aside from Mr. Smith, Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, is expected to replace Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa, as chairman of the Senate Veteran Affairs Committee, and Jim Nicholson has been nominated by the president to succeed Veteran Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi.
"There’s an underlying scheme here somewhere," said Mr. Gorman. "We don’t see any of this as positive. We’re sort of with our backs against the wall right now, waiting to see what happens."
If nothing else, Mr. Cullinan said, removing Mr. Smith means that veterans may not see as much advocacy in Congress, because other Republicans will now know to keep their mouths shut.
"It sends a very clear message to other allies (of veterans) in the Republican Party," he said. "If you stray from the party line, you’re going to pay the consequences. Others are going to be afraid to push too hard."
As for the veterans, all they can do is keep pushing members of Congress to fund veterans’ health care properly, said Mr. Cullinan. "We’ll continue to fight the good fight," he said.
What Now?
Washington, of course, is no stranger to marches of support. Still, Harold Miller would like to see another one, and perhaps he would name it "The Million Vet March." Whatever it would be called, the Florence resident and World War II Navy vet said any show of support for Mr. Smith should be big. And, given that Mr. Smith hails from New Jersey, said Mr. Yancey, New Jersey veterans ought to be the ones to take the helm.
Any show of support for Mr. Smith is, of course, tempered with a healthy mistrust of Mr. Buyer, whom Mr. Bal called "a yes man." It is also tempered with a sense of doubt. Maybe if Mr. Smith hadn’t pushed so hard, Mr. DelCasino said, he might have remained on the Veterans Affairs Committee and "done us some good."
"Sometimes it’s better to be smart than go whole hog," agreed Mr. Miller. But Tom Gorse, a World War II Army vet answered, "Maybe he couldn’t live with himself if he did."
In the end, any chance to get their champion back in the driver’s seat or even back in the car would require solidarity. For the moment, though, the vets said they would like to tell Mr. Smith exactly how they feel.
"I want to thank Chris Smith personally," said VFW Commander and World War II Army vet Steve Mognancki. "Shake his hand. He’s the best man we had in there. He’s the only friend veterans ever had."