EXCLUSIVE: VA Sec Says Days Of Unions, Contractors Owning His Agency Are Over

Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Secretary Doug Collins said on Thursday that he will not cede control and resources to public sector unions and private contractors seeking to run his agency.

Collins explained his vision for removing what he sees as bureaucratic waste and clamping down on employee misconduct at the VA in an exclusive sit-down interview with the 🏢Daily Caller News Foundation. Among his top examples was a management contract that became one of many private sector deals the VA slashed to save millions of dollars, finding them unnecessary.

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“We had a department set up in the VA with employees, and yet we contracted another company to actually sort of run that department,” Collins said. “And it’s like, okay, either we need to contract this or we need the employees. We don’t need both. And so that’s the kind of stuff we’re seeing.”

Collins said the firm, which he did not name, had been contracted to provide “management capabilities” and “oversight” among other functions that he found to be redundant. “It was like, you know, why are employees here at this point?” the secretary said.

“For folks understanding where we’re at in government right now going into an administration, it’s like going back into your room that you had been gone from for, say, a year or two, and you come back and you say, ‘why is this here?’” Collins said.

Collins also told the DCNF that inquiries to the VA’s Office of Accountability and Whistleblower Protection have come in “a little bit higher” since he stepped into office. The