Highlights of Senator Boxer's Record Supporting Veterans

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Senator Barbara Boxer believes we must never forget, and never fail to honor, those brave men and women who have served our country and fought to preserve America’s freedoms, principles, and ideals. America’s veterans deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. Senator Boxer believes that the federal government has a moral obligation to live up to its commitments.

• End Delays in Health Care Funding: Funding for veterans’ health care has too often become embroiled in, and been delayed by, partisan bickering in Washington – bickering that has nothing to do with veterans.  Veterans have already sacrificed; they shouldn’t have to sacrifice their health care because of Congressional inaction.  Senator Boxer supports ensuring that the VA has sufficient, timely, and predictable funding, including supporting legislation that would fund the VA a year in advance.

• Improve Mental Health Care: Senator Boxer is the lead Democratic sponsor of bipartisan legislation to improve the mental health care benefits for service members and veterans, including members of the Guard and Reserves.  The bill would enhance the counseling and other benefits available to survivors.  This action followed a law that Senator Boxer authored in 2005 to create a Defense Task Force on Mental Health in order to develop a strategic plan for addressing mental health issues within the Armed Forces.

• Provide Life Insurance Coverage for PTSD: Beginning in 2005, the Traumatic Injury Survivors’ Group Life Insurance program pays a one-time, tax-free benefit of up to $100,000 to cover the short-term costs of service members who suffer a debilitating injury, such as a traumatic brain injury or the loss of an arm or eye.  Senator Boxer is fighting to expand the program to include severe and acute Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  In 2008, she wrote a law to require the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to submit a report to Congress on expanding the insurance program to cover PTSD.

• Enhance Research on Brain Injuries and PTSD: Over the past two years, Senator Boxer has successfully secured $9 million in funding for the Veterans Health Research Institute at the San Francisco VA Medical Center.  This funding is being used to improve the diagnosis, prevention, and management of traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, and PTSD.

• Fund Meals for Hospitalized Members of the Military: Senator Boxer was outraged to learn in 2003 that hospitalized members of the military were actually being charged for their hospital meals, imposing a serious financial burden on some members of the military and their families.  When Congress sought to reverse this policy, Senator Boxer led the successful fight to make it retroactive to September 11, 2001, ensuring that hospitalized veterans from the Afghanistan and Iraq conflicts who had paid for their meals would be reimbursed for them.