WATCHDOG CRITICIZES VA OVER EUROPE TRIP
Coffman calls for resignation, saying, “It is time to clean house”
VA Secretary David Shulkin’s chief of staff doctored an email and made false statements to create a pretext for taxpayers to pay for the secretary’s wife on a trip to Europe, the agency’s inspector general found.
WASHINGTON» Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin improperly accepted Wimbledon tennis tickets and his staff lied that he was getting an award in order to justify his wife accompanying him at taxpayer expense on an 11-day European trip that mixed business and sightseeing, according to a blistering government investigation released Wednesday.
The 87-page report by the VA’s internal watchdog said Shulkin should reimburse the government more than $4,000 for his wife’s airfare and accused his top aide of doctoring emails to falsely represent that Shulkin was being honored in Denmark, inventing a rationale for his wife’s free travel.
“The investigation revealed serious derelictions” by Shulkin and his staff, said the report, which cited “poor judgment and/or misconduct.”
The findings are the latest in a series of controversies involving expensive or wasteful plane travel by top Trump administration officials. President Donald Trump’s health secretary, Tom Price, resigned in September after questions arose about his use of private jets for multiple government trips.
Top lawmakers on the congressional oversight committees urged Shulkin, a former VA undersecretary of health who served in the Obama administration, to address the findings fully. They stressed in a joint statement that “whether intentional or not, misusing taxpayer dollars is unacceptable.”
Rep. Mike Coffman, R-Colo., a member of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, called on Shulkin to resign and said “it is time to clean house at the VA.”
The call for his resignation is especially significant given that Coffman is a Republican and Shulkin was nominated last year by President Donald Trump to lead the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Coffman also has been a longtime member of the House veterans committee.