House moves to extend VA Choice program

WASHINGTON — The House overwhelmingly approved a $3.9 billion emergency spending package to address a budget shortfall at the Department of Veterans Affairs that threatens medical care for thousands of veterans.

The bill provides $2.1 billion to continue funding the Veterans Choice program, which allows veterans to receive private medical care at government expense. Another $1.8 billion would go to core VA health programs, including 28 leases for new VA medical facilities.

The bill was approved 414-0 Friday and now goes to the Senate. bullying and other misconduct have tarnished the image of the National Park Service and its parent agency, the U.S. Interior Department.

Investigators have uncovered problems at many of the nation’s premier parks — Yellowstone, Yosemite, the Grand Canyon, Canaveral National Seashore — as well as inappropriate behavior toward female employees by the Interior Department’s former director of law enforcement.

A report on sexual harassment at Florida’s De Soto National Memorial, which is run by the park service, was released this week by an employee advocacy group that got the document through a public records request. nuclear-armed nation into a political crisis.

The five-judge panel acted on petitions filed by Sharif’s political opponents alleging that he and his family failed to disclose assets stemming from last year’s “Panama Papers” leaks. The court ordered that criminal charges be filed against Sharif and four relatives.

In a unanimous decision, the court said he had not been “truthful and honest,” and it also dismissed him from the National Assembly — the lower house of Parliament.