2nd losers, Veterans again. The Department of Veterans Affairs say's the freeze complicates the provision of veterans services by an agency that is chronically understaffed.
Some veterans took to Twitter this week, tweeting Trump stories of canceled job interviews for frozen positions and urging him to reconsider the order, some pointing out they had voted for him.
The VA has 41,500 vacancies for doctors, nurses and other medical professionals across its sprawling health care system, according to a 2015 report.
Acting VA Secretary Robert Snyder told McClatchy in an email that the agency will exempt from the hiring freeze "anyone it deems necessary for public safety, including frontline caregivers."
The VA provides care for more than 9 million veterans through 1,700 facilities it operates across the country. The quality of that service has been questioned since 2014, when the VA acknowledged that 23 veterans had died while they were waiting for appointments.
Peter Kauffmann, senior adviser to VoteVets, a liberal veterans advocacy group, called the inclusion of the VA in the hiring freeze "the ultimate insult."
"If his executive order leads to preventable deaths, that will be on Donald Trump's hands, and we will hold him personally accountable," he said.
Trump's presidential memorandum, issued Monday, ordered "a freeze on the hiring of federal civilian employees to be applied across the board in the executive branch" for 90 days, except for positions in the military or otherwise affecting national security and public safety.
"This freeze raises serious concerns about the president's commitment to veterans and improving the VA," said Paul Rieckhoff, an Iraq War veteran who is the head of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. "Over the past day, countless IAVA members have contacted us concerned about the future of their health care. Job seekers waiting to hear about a hiring determination just had their hope dashed."
Some veterans took to Twitter this week, tweeting Trump stories of canceled job interviews for frozen positions and urging him to reconsider the order, some pointing out they had voted for him.
The VA has 41,500 vacancies for doctors, nurses and other medical professionals across its sprawling health care system, according to a 2015 report.
Acting VA Secretary Robert Snyder told McClatchy in an email that the agency will exempt from the hiring freeze "anyone it deems necessary for public safety, including frontline caregivers."
The VA provides care for more than 9 million veterans through 1,700 facilities it operates across the country. The quality of that service has been questioned since 2014, when the VA acknowledged that 23 veterans had died while they were waiting for appointments.
Peter Kauffmann, senior adviser to VoteVets, a liberal veterans advocacy group, called the inclusion of the VA in the hiring freeze "the ultimate insult."
"If his executive order leads to preventable deaths, that will be on Donald Trump's hands, and we will hold him personally accountable," he said.
Trump's presidential memorandum, issued Monday, ordered "a freeze on the hiring of federal civilian employees to be applied across the board in the executive branch" for 90 days, except for positions in the military or otherwise affecting national security and public safety.
"This freeze raises serious concerns about the president's commitment to veterans and improving the VA," said Paul Rieckhoff, an Iraq War veteran who is the head of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. "Over the past day, countless IAVA members have contacted us concerned about the future of their health care. Job seekers waiting to hear about a hiring determination just had their hope dashed."