By Morgan Sweeney
The Center Square

As part of a visit to the Washington, D.C., veterans’ medical center Wednesday, Department of Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins publicly urged Democrats in Congress to approve Republicans’ stopgap funding bill to reopen the government.

He called on his “friends across the aisle” – for a number of years, Collins served as a Republican congressman in the House of Representatives – to “open the government” and then negotiate policy.

“Quit holding my veterans hostage right now,” Collins said.

Most of the department is operating normally thanks to advance appropriations. In fact, before discussing the shutdown’s impacts on the VA, Collins made a point of reassuring veterans and the public that certain essential services remain available – partly made possible by government employees working without pay. Health care centers and clinics are operating, but most of the Veterans Benefits Administration is furloughed.

“Our disabilities payments are still being made. Please don’t worry about your disability benefits,” Collins said. “We’re all processing them, but I’m having them processed by people who are not getting paid…. We need to fix that.”

The VA is one of the largest employers in the executive branch. As of June 1, it had roughly 467,000 employees, though it expected to shed another 12,000 by the end of last month. Twenty-two days into the shutdown, approximately 35,000 of its workers are furloughed, according to Collins.

That impacts some of the services the department typically provides, such as outreach to veterans, education call centers, and vocational services to veterans transitioning to civilian life. The VA has people who can typically help veterans looking for work outside of the military, but they’re part of the group that is furloughed.

“We have some people who are trying to make a life outside of their time in the service, and they can’t do this because Congress has decided that they want to shut the government down,” Collins said.

The VA has also touted record claims processing rates, announcing a 25% reduction in disability claims processing in May. It also processed over 2,517,000 claims in fiscal year 2024 but had already processed more than 2,524,000 with nearly two months left in fiscal year 2025.

Now in FY 2026, Collins told The Center Square that the shutdown has “slowed” claims processing progress but he’s still optimistic about what the department is accomplishing – and he anticipates another record-breaking announcement soon.

“I’m hoping to have an announcement pretty soon that we’re going to be at historic levels. And I think, really, right now, we’re at historic levels now because… if you take COVID and PACT Act, which actually increased our workload a little bit,” Collins said, “we’re probably as close to historic levels of disability backlogs.”

He also said that his hope is for the VA to be able to process disability claims in under 60 days within the next year.

“On all claims. Not just the ones we’re fast-tracking,” Collins said. “I’m very proud of what we’re doing.”

Typically, government employees who are furloughed due to a shutdown receive back pay when the government reopens, but the White House has made some controversial comments suggesting this may not be the case for everyone.