YOU’RE FIRED! Trump’s VA Terminates 500, Suspends 200 For Misconduct

[yota691]

 U.S. President Donald Trump attends the Women’s Entrepreneurship Finance event during the G20 leaders summit in Hamburg, Germany July 8, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

YOU’RE FIRED! Trump’s VA Terminates 500, Suspends 200 For Misconduct

 

LUKE ROSIAK

Investigative Reporter

 

 

6:44 PM 07/09/2017

 

 

Five hundred and forty-eight Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) employees have been terminated since President Donald Trump took office, indicating that his campaign pledge to clean up “probably the most incompetently run agency in the United States” by relentlessly putting his TV catch phrase “you’re fired” into action was more than just empty rhetoric.

Another 200 VA workers were suspended and 33 demoted, according to data newly published by the department as part of VA Secretary David Shulkin’s commitment to greater transparency. Those disciplined include 22 senior leaders, more than 70 nurses, 14 police officers, and 25 physicians.

Also disciplined were a program analyst dealing with the Government Accountability Office, which audits the department, a public affairs specialist, a chief of police and a chief of surgery.

Many housekeeping aides and food service workers — lower-level jobs in which the department has employed felons and convicted sex offenders — were also fired.

 

Scores of veterans have died waiting for care while VA bureaucrats falsified data to procure monetary bonuses, but fixes have been slow to come by largely because the union that represents VA employees has used its political muscle with Democrats to emphasize job security for government employees.

Former President Barack Obama originally appointed Shulkin as a VA undersecretary. By the end of the Obama administration, however, Shulkin had grown increasingly frustrated with the American Federation of Government Employees union and other groups defending bad employees’ supposed right to a government check even when they hurt veterans.

“Just last week we were forced to take back an employee after they were convicted no more than three times for DWI and had served a 60 day jail sentence … Our accountability processes are clearly broken,” Shulkin said at the White House.

In addition to reluctance by managers to vigorously pursue firings, the overturning of firings after the fact by the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) — often with little public acknowledgment — has been a longstanding problem.

 

Shulkin asked for new legislation that reduces the role of MSPB, especially when firing senior leaders. Congress passed the Department of Veterans Affairs Accountability and Whistleblower Protection Act in answer, and Trump signed the bill in June.

The published data predates those new powers, and does not note which disciplinary actions were later overturned.

One record shows a “senior leader” being removed January 20, while another record shows a “senior leader” being demoted April 21. Those appear to refer to the same person — disgraced Puerto Rico VA director DeWayne Hamlin — who returned to work in a lesser job after he appealed to the MSPB.

Former Obama Secretary of Veterans Affairs Bob McDonald seemed to have so little grasp on firing employees that in August 2016, he said that he had fired 140,000 employees, a figure that made little sense since that would be nearly half the workforce.

He said “you can’t fire your way to excellence” and blamed “negative news articles” for a morose culture, rather than the individuals perpetrating the misconduct described in those articles. (RELATED: Feds Return Nurse Accused Of Manslaughter To Work)

Though high-level hospital officials were affected, according to the data covering the first six months of the Trump administration, relatively few disciplinary actions occurred in the central offices where Washington bureaucrats work. Those employ fewer people than the hospitals, but repeated scandals have also shown such employees looking out for one another to preserve each others’ jobs.

There were five firings in the Veterans Health Administration Central Office, including one senior leader. There were also two in the Office of General Counsel, and one in the office of Congressional and Legislative affairs.

The data does not include employees’ names, and does not show which employees were on new-employee probationary status. Employees can be fired much more easily during their first year.

During the Obama administration, McDonald lamented that in the private sector “you cut a deal with the employee and you’re able to buy them out,” but said you cannot do that in government.

Yet VA repeatedly made five and six-figure payments to bad employees to get them to quit after they threatened to gum up the works by appealing disciplinary actions. The department even allowed Hamlin to offer a low-level employee $300,000 to quit after she refused to help management retaliate against a whistleblower who exposed Hamlin’s arrest.

The agency paid more than $5 million in settlements to employees under McDonald, which had the effect of encouraging bad employees to relentlessly appeal and make unsupported charges of discrimination when they were targeted for discipline, in an often-successful attempt to convert punishment into reward.

Shulkin said he “will look to settle with employees only when they clearly have been wronged … and not as a matter of ordinary business.”

[bostonangler]

That's good news... Our Vets deserve better...

 

B/A

[Texstorm]

Quote

Good Morning DV ! Dang that wasn't a swamp in Washington , It's the Loch Ness and it's far deeper than any of us could have ever imagined !

 

[Muleslayer]

Slow work mucking out the swamp.

[pokerplayer]

5 minutes ago, Muleslayer said:

Slow work mucking out the swamp.

 

Your right. Trump doe's not appear interested in making friends in power, just wants to help the average taxpayer IMHO and yes those in power should be afraid.....very afraid.

 

pp

[George Hayduke]

Good news for those of us who have endured the patronizing instructions from the VA employee leeches: Follow the blue line, follow the yellow line, follow the green line... what, we're lab rats? 

[SnowGlobe7]

How do I apply for one of these positions...still looking for a job!!!!

[Shedagal]

2 hours ago, SnowGlobe7 said:

How do I apply for one of these positions...still looking for a job!!!!

Bless your heart, Snow.  I know you're not a newbie in job hunting, but have you tried staffing agencies or Indeed?  You might have mentioned it before, but (if you don't mind), what kind of job are you desiring?

[SnowGlobe7]

I am using  indeed. Also linked in, Glassdoor and a few more, but these  seems to have the better positions. Staffing positions are so depressing and I have not had any luck there. I have had a offer for the midnight shift for minimum wage for thee months as a temporary. I passed on this, was just not good for my daughter and me.

 

I have done all aspects of Human Resources, payroll accounts payable and accounts receivable P&L statements, banking reconciliation including Credit Card reconciliation. 

 

The last couple of years I have taught at my daughters school, it is something I so very enjoy and would love to continue but it was a temporary position that is now down to two days a week and with other things going on I can no longer do just so two days I need full time. 

 

But I can not even get a "cashier" interview these days. I have excellent references and nothing shorter than 8  years at any position but man it is just tough to get in the door

[Shedagal]

24 minutes ago, SnowGlobe7 said:

I am using  indeed. Also linked in, Glassdoor and a few more, but these  seems to have the better positions. Staffing positions are so depressing and I have not had any luck there. I have had a offer for the midnight shift for minimum wage for thee months as a temporary. I passed on this, was just not good for my daughter and me.

 

I have done all aspects of Human Resources, payroll accounts payable and accounts receivable P&L statements, banking reconciliation including Credit Card reconciliation. 

 

The last couple of years I have taught at my daughters school, it is something I so very enjoy and would love to continue but it was a temporary position that is now down to two days a week and with other things going on I can no longer do just so two days I need full time. 

 

But I can not even get a "cashier" interview these days. I have excellent references and nothing shorter than 8  years at any position but man it is just tough to get in the door

That is crazy, Snow!  I know a few people in the Tulsa area.  I'll ask around.

[Markinsa]

7 hours ago, SnowGlobe7 said:

How do I apply for one of these positions...still looking for a job!!!!

 

https://www.va.gov/jobs/

 

.

[yota691]

 

[patrickgold]

Okay people you've got ten days to get your act together OR you're FIRED!!!

It's sick when we have incompetent employees that treat our Veterans in this manner. Spit, spit on you😑

[SnowGlobe7]

gals will love this!!!

[Karsten]

Strange how under the obama administration no one was fires as they couldn't be due to the Government Rules and Processes.....Back then the only option they had was to move people around to a higher paid position while claiming they were being punished.....What a joke.

 

Now let's see Trump go after the IRS and koskinen and his minions.

 

Karsten

[George Hayduke]

2 hours ago, Karsten said:

Now let's see Trump go after the IRS and koskinen and his minions.

 

One can only hope.

[Moxie64]

Bet they gave  obama a kickback to keep their jobs.

 

 for now

[md11fr8dawg]

That place is a cesspool of Obummer appointed liberal corrupt hacks, over there at the VA. They draw their paycheck and basically do nothing to help anyone. And the when the covers are pulled back and they are exposed for the fraud they are, they want to punish the people that blew the whistle and the people who care. That place needs to be exterminated of those cock roaches.