By Dave Bradley, West Liberty
When former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley campaigned for candidate Mariannette Miller-Meeks in 2020, she told a Davenport gathering Miller-Meeks will bring moral clarity to the health care reform debate in the country and fight to protect the Trump tax cuts.
While the latter may be true, Miller-Meeks is a fraud without moral clarity because of her March 3 “no” vote that denied veterans health care benefits they deserve in H.R. 3967, the Honoring our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act of 2021, which includes exposure to toxic burn pits.
Miller-Meeks became spokesperson for the opposition giving a speech on the House floor claiming the bill was too expensive.
Her argument failed as 34 Republicans joined Democrats to pass the bipartisan measure.
If Miller-Meeks is concerned about cost, she could urge the billionaire tax cheats created during the Trump administration to pay up and support our veterans.
The PACT Act solved a real problem with military service member exposure to toxic waste using jet fuel in large ground pits during Iraq and Afghanistan. It would provide disability benefits to thousands of veterans who became ill with cancer, bronchitis, and COPD. Importantly, the VA would presume during warfare veterans developed their illness because of exposure to burn pits (or Agent Orange in Vietnam).
Miller-Meeks can’t claim to support bipartisan legislation if she won’t take care of our veterans.
We need someone like Christina Bohannan in the Congress, someone who understands the needs of veterans.
This article was originally published in Little Village issue 304.
