Veterans committees getting it done

WASHINGTON — Magnanimous hearings. Bipartisan votes. Substantial legislation on its way to becoming law.

This is Congress? Something strange is happening in the staid hearing rooms of the House and Senate veteran affairs committees here this summer, though few have taken notice.

As the rest of Congress fights over the health care overhaul and looming budget deadlines, the committees responsible for writing legislation affecting veterans quietly are moving forward with an ambitious, long-sought and largely bipartisan agenda that has the potential to significantly reshape the way the nation cares for its 21 million veterans. It also could provide President Donald Trump with a set of policy victories he badly wants.

“It’s a case study in Washington working as designed,” said Phillip Carter, who studies veterans issues at the Center for a New American Security and advises Democrats. “And it’s shocking because we so rarely see it these days.”

The tally thus far is impressive, if not exactly the stuff of headline news: The secretary of Veterans Affairs was confirmed unanimously, the only Cabinet secretary with that level of congressional approval. Congress quickly passed a temporary funding extension for the Veterans Choice Program, which pays for private-sector health care for veterans facing long wait times at government facilities. Then it passed a bill that makes it easier for the department to hire and fire. The next bit of legislation on the brink of becoming law expedites disability benefits appeals.

Whether the latest bout of amity can persist will largely depend on whether lawmakers are able to agree on a way to permanently fix the program, and streamline a half dozen others that send veterans out for private care, before it loses its authorization in January.