‘Extremely disturbing and unethical’: new rules allow VA doctors to refuse to treat Democrats, unmarried veterans

[Simon W. Moon]

So veterans can be refused care at the VA?

According to the VA press secretary, Peter Kasperowicz, who is quoted in the article in the OP, the answer to your question, is that doctors can refuse to treat people for these reasons.

"refused care" seems to imply that the entire VA is refusing treatment.

Whereas in reality, the VA is attempting to dodge the appearance of responsibility by creating a policy which allows individual doctors to choose to create an issue.​

But, the VA Still retains responsibility for the actions of their agents who are acting under the policies the VA enact.​

That will be an issue, if it ever happens.

If something can go wrong, it will go wrong.

A policy which creates situation which will cause an issue to occur is also an issue.​

​

imho.​

​

ymmv​

 

[EnchantedMuggle]

One step closer to separate drinking fountains.

 

[Ahlevah]

A "rumor" confirmed by VA press secretary, Peter Kasperowicz.

The Guardian said he “did not dispute” the paper’s characterization of the rules. How do you get from that to “confirmation” of its version of these rules? The paper said it obtained a copy of the new rules. Why won’t it quote from it?

Why do you feel that the paper is obligated to reconcile the self-contradictory statements of a political appointee?

Because I don’t believe these ****ers anymore. Instead of publishing the documents and letting people come to their own conclusions, they give the color commentary without showing the ballgame.

That feels more like the job of the person who made the self-contradictory statements, imho.

Just as easily he didn’t do that, and The Guardian is misrepresenting the truth to support a narrative. Because when I read the original EO, what The Guardian is claiming doesn’t logically proceed from it: “Trump’s VA now says its doctors can refuse treatment to Democrats!”

This "leftist lunacy" HAS BEEN CONFIRMED BY TRUMP'S POLITICAL APPOINTEE

Really? So where is the e-mail?

The Trump appointee AND the Guardian are saying the same thing.

How do you know that? Where is the e-mail?

The Trump Admin agrees that the Guardian's interpretation is correct.

Your opinion seems to be an outlier.

Apparently not:

The Department of Veteran Affairs on Monday harshly condemned what it called a false Guardian report that claimed recent updates in VA medical center bylaws could result in certain veterans being refused treatment.

The VA explained that the updates in medical center bylaws were to ensure compliance with White House executive orders, and "will have no impact whatsoever on who VA treats or who works at VA."

The VA stated that "the fact that The Guardian is trying to misrepresent these changes as anything more than a formality underscores its extreme liberal bias and steadfast commitment to spreading disinformation."

https://www.newsmax.com/amp/us/va-hospitals-care-executive-order/2025/06/16/id/1215146/

Is it really too much too much to ask to read the actual regulations instead of having it regurgitated through the LGBTQI+ liberal media spin machine?

 

[NuffSaid]

View attachment 67575002

You’d support anything Trump does, even if he said all Democrats are on the terrorist watch list and are banned from traveling.

 

[aofie]

I hate to suggest this but it needs suggesting, the next Democratic President can reverse this and target Republicans.


If THAT happens we all know how LOUD the whining and moaning will be.

At the rate they're going, they're won't ever be a Democratic President ever again.

That party is a mess.

 

[Bodi]

Medical staff are still required to treat veterans regardless of race, color, religion and sex, and all veterans remain entitled to treatment.

So it doesn't actually affect anybody...

 

[Simon W. Moon]

Just as easily he didn’t do that, and The Guardian is misrepresenting the truth to support a narrative. Because when I read the original EO, what The Guardian is claiming doesn’t logically proceed from it: “Trump’s VA now says its doctors can refuse treatment to Democrats!”

Is it really too much too much to ask to read the actual regulations instead of having it regurgitated through the LGBTQI+ liberal media spin machine?

Off the top of your head, how are each of these things impacted by the EO?


(i) “The White House Toolkit on Transgender Equality”;
(ii) the Department of Education's guidance documents including:

(A) “2024 Title IX Regulations: Pointers for Implementation” (July 2024);​

(B) “U.S. Department of Education Toolkit: Creating Inclusive and Nondiscriminatory School Environments for LGBTQI+ Students”;​

(C) “U.S. Department of Education Supporting LGBTQI+ Youth and Families in School” (June 21, 2023);​

(D) “Departamento de Educación de EE.UU. Apoyar a los jóvenes y familias LGBTQI+ en la escuela” (June 21, 2023);​

(E) “Supporting Intersex Students: A Resource for Students, Families, and Educators” (October 2021);​

(F) “Supporting Transgender Youth in School” (June 2021);​

(G) “Letter to Educators on Title IX's 49th Anniversary” (June 23, 2021);​

(H) “Confronting Anti-LGBTQI+ Harassment in Schools: A Resource for Students and Families” (June 2021);​

(I) “Enforcement of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 With Respect to Discrimination Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in Light of Bostock v. Clayton County” (June 22, 2021);​

(J) “Education in a Pandemic: The Disparate Impacts of COVID-19 on America's Students” (June 9, 2021); and​

(K) “Back-to-School Message for Transgender Students from the U.S. Depts of Justice, Education, and HHS” (Aug. 17, 2021);​

(iii) the Attorney General's Memorandum of March 26, 2021 entitled “Application of Bostock v. Clayton County to Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972”; and
(iv) the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's “Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace” (April 29, 2024).

 

[W_Heisenberg]

So it doesn't actually affect anybody...

Someone, somewhere has to pick up the slack. And depending on what you're being treated for and where you live it might be a big problem. For example, If a patient lives in a rural region or needs specialty care there may not be enough healthcare practitioners to pick up the slack. On the whole, it's a really bad idea to allow individuals to refuse treatment to patients. And I know it's super difficult for Trump supporters to think about others, to express empathy, but I hope that they would imagine what it would like for them if they were denied care on the basis of their political beliefs or marital status.

 

[Simon W. Moon]

https://www.newsmax.com/amp/us/va-hospitals-care-executive-order/2025/06/16/id/1215146/

Here's some double-speak for you to trust.

The VA added that a series of other such claims in The Guardian article were also untrue.​

In one such example, the newspaper's claim that "individual workers are now free to decline to care for patients based on personal characteristics not explicitly prohibited by federal law” is false, with the VA emphatically stating that "federal law prohibits that, and VA will always follow federal law."​

Federal law prohibits declining to treat people on the basis of characteristics not explicitly prohibited by federal law?

Do you wonder how that would work?

Or do you just naturally find government double-speak trustworthy

 

[Simon W. Moon]

So it doesn't actually affect anybody...

If it shouldn't affect anybody, then they filled a pot with shit to fill a pot with shit.

 

[Plasmaball]

So the right hate the troops. I remember when the right whined about how the left spit on troops.

Guess thats gone now

 

[Ahlevah]

Off the top of your head, how are each of these things impacted by the EO?


(i) “The White House Toolkit on Transgender Equality”;
(ii) the Department of Education's guidance documents including:

(A) “2024 Title IX Regulations: Pointers for Implementation” (July 2024);​

(B) “U.S. Department of Education Toolkit: Creating Inclusive and Nondiscriminatory School Environments for LGBTQI+ Students”;​

(C) “U.S. Department of Education Supporting LGBTQI+ Youth and Families in School” (June 21, 2023);​

(D) “Departamento de Educación de EE.UU. Apoyar a los jóvenes y familias LGBTQI+ en la escuela” (June 21, 2023);​

(E) “Supporting Intersex Students: A Resource for Students, Families, and Educators” (October 2021);​

(F) “Supporting Transgender Youth in School” (June 2021);​

(G) “Letter to Educators on Title IX's 49th Anniversary” (June 23, 2021);​

(H) “Confronting Anti-LGBTQI+ Harassment in Schools: A Resource for Students and Families” (June 2021);​

(I) “Enforcement of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 With Respect to Discrimination Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in Light of Bostock v. Clayton County” (June 22, 2021);​

(J) “Education in a Pandemic: The Disparate Impacts of COVID-19 on America's Students” (June 9, 2021); and​

(K) “Back-to-School Message for Transgender Students from the U.S. Depts of Justice, Education, and HHS” (Aug. 17, 2021);​

(iii) the Attorney General's Memorandum of March 26, 2021 entitled “Application of Bostock v. Clayton County to Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972”; and
(iv) the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's “Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace” (April 29, 2024).

When we start to peel back the layers of the onion we can see that this is not so much about denying care to Democrats but getting the government out the business of affirming transgender “rights.” For example, if a biological male vet concludes he was really born a woman he shouldn’t expect taxpayers to pay for his gender dysphoria counseling and his new set of D-cup knockers. Is that about the, um, size of it?

 

[Ahlevah]

Do you wonder how that would work?

Or do you just naturally find government double-speak trustworthy

No, but when you said the Trump Administration agreed with The Guardian my Bullshit Alarm was screaming.

 

[MTAtech]

I hate to suggest this but it needs suggesting, the next Democratic President can reverse this and target Republicans.


If THAT happens we all know how LOUD the whining and moaning will be.

A Democratic president will never do that. That’s the difference.

I suggest there will be a boycott of doctors that discriminate on that basis. The insurance companies may also kick those doctors out of their network.

 

[SNOWFLAKE]

At the rate they're going, they're won't ever be a Democratic President ever again.

That party is a mess.

 

[sanman]

‘Extremely disturbing and unethical’: new rules allow VA doctors to refuse to treat Democrats, unmarried veterans

Trump order allows VA staff to decline providing healthcare to patients based on political affiliation or marital status

www.theguardian.com

Medical staff are still required to treat veterans regardless of race, color, religion and sex, and all veterans remain entitled to treatment. But individual workers are now free to decline to care for patients based on personal characteristics not explicitly prohibited by federal law.

Language requiring healthcare professionals to care for veterans regardless of their politics and marital status has been explicitly eliminated.

--

The bottom line is that Trump and his supporters do not view their political opponents as equal citizens. They view them as enemies

You've inserted the word "Democrats" in there. This is your invention.
There is nothing in the EO that states this.

 

[Simon W. Moon]

When we start to peel back the layers of the onion we can see that this is not so much about denying care to Democrats but getting the government out the business of affirming transgender “rights.” For example, if a biological male vet concludes he was really born a woman he shouldn’t expect taxpayers to pay for his gender dysphoria counseling and his new set of D-cup knockers. Is that about the, um, size of it?

iow, you are ignorant of the implications for these items

HOWEVER,

you remain certain that the implications cannot be what is reported.

 

[Simon W. Moon]

No, but when you said the Trump Administration agreed with The Guardian my Bullshit Alarm was screaming.

No comments about the doublespeak bullshit you cited as a source?

 

[Ahlevah]

So the right hate the troops. I remember when the right whined about how the left spit on troops.

Guess thats gone now

Only two days ago the Left made it a point to hate the Army. They celebrated people waving Mexican flags over a parade celebrating the U.S. Army’s 250th birthday. They wanted it to fail. Still, it was a great show, even if some ill-disciplined soldiers, probably Democrats, couldn’t or wouldn’t hold a cadence:



The WWII re-enactors did a better job:

 

[coyote505]

I hate to suggest this but it needs suggesting, the next Democratic President can reverse this and target Republicans.


If THAT happens we all know how LOUD the whining and moaning will be.

Trumpetistas can always go to their local Faith Healer.

 

[SNOWFLAKE]

Only two days ago the Left made it a point to hate the Army. They celebrated people waving Mexican flags over a parade celebrating the U.S. Army’s 250th birthday. They wanted it to fail. Still, it was a great show, even if some ill-disciplined soldiers, probably Democrats, couldn’t or wouldn’t hold a cadence:



The WWII re-enactors did a better job:

Trump's Parade​

"No Kings" protest crowd in Saint Paul, Minnesota:​

 

[coyote505]

Then the Dr would treat them and refer them for a psych consult. The providers of the VA or otherwise don't get to deny medical care because of a political/social stance. There are medical ethics that apply.

And I would certainly hope that the relevant medical society would take action against any doc taking advantage of this policy to discriminate in the treatment of soldiers or veterans. If the docs have reasonable medical ethics, these new rules will be meaningless, other than to show just how Wacko T. Rump has become.

 

[Along Came Jones]

The VA response posted to X:

This story is disinformation. All eligible Veterans will always be welcome at VA and will always receive the benefits and services they’ve earned under the law.

 

[TheDoctorWasIn]

This is being greatly misunderstood. What has happened isn't good, but it's not as bad as everyone is making it out to be.

I'm going to have to start with some background. From the 70s on, the United States has passed a number of laws that prevent discrimination on various bases - race, color, sex, national origin, age, and disability.

In 2000, President Bill Clinton issued an Executive Order adding additional bases that the Executive Branch could not discriminate against - those being marital status, and political affiliation. This was obviously less reaching than the others, since they were laws that applied to everyone, rather than rules that applied only to the Government. But those rules did prevent agents of the federal government from discriminating on those bases.

Obama and Biden followed suit, protecting sexual orientation and gender identity by the government as well.

Trump repealed all of those protections.

Now, this in reality will not result in the VA denying service to Democrats. The VA as a whole has to provide service to those deemed eligible by law.

It does mean that individual doctors at the VA could hypothetically refuse to provide service based on political affiliation or martial status. But that would violate a whole bunch of medical ethics rules (which VA doctors have to follow, too) so I don't really think it's actually going to happen.

 

[W_Heisenberg]

The VA response posted to X:

This story is disinformation. All eligible Veterans will always be welcome at VA and will always receive the benefits and services they’ve earned under the law.

This comment does not refute the claim being made in the article.