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In May, President Trump signed Executive Order 14296, titled “Keeping Promises to Veterans and Establishing a National Center for Warrior Independence.” On its surface, the order presents itself as a positive step toward improving care and benefits for veterans by expanding choices and restoring accountability at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). But beneath the rhetoric, the order contains provisions that could endanger the very systems that protect veterans’ access to quality care—and silence those who fight to uphold that care.
At the heart of the concern is Section 4 of the Executive Order, which directs the VA Secretary to take “appropriate action” against employees accused of misconduct and to revisit decisions by the previous administration that reinstated or reimbursed certain employees. The language of the order is broad and vague, leaving enormous discretion in the hands of the VA Secretary. This section appears to build upon the controversial Restore VA Accountability Act of 2025, legislation that critics warn would make it easier to fire or demote employees—without sufficient due process or oversight.
How Does this Impact Veterans?
The VA’s ability to deliver on its mission of serving veterans depends on a workforce that can safely report problems without fear of retaliation. The VA is known to be one of the largest sources of federal whistleblower complaints. Employees regularly raise concerns about mismanagement, fraud, patient safety risks, and failures in care delivery. Whistleblowers have been key to exposing issues such as waitlist scandals, substandard facility conditions, and improper use of funds—issues that directly affect the quality of services veterans receive.
However, instead of strengthening the protections that allow VA employees to speak up, Executive Order 14296 threatens to erode them. By giving the VA Secretary sweeping authority to discipline or remove employees accused of misconduct—without adequate external oversight—the order creates an environment ripe for abuse. Whistleblowers could find themselves targeted under the guise of “accountability,” with no independent body to ensure that such actions are fair or justified.
This concern is not hypothetical. As Tom Devine, Legal Director of the Government Accountability Project, shared in his testimony on the related Restore VA Accountability Act, these kinds of measures could leave whistleblowers “in the dark without adequate institutions in place to sufficiently protect them.” Without robust protections, employees may stay silent rather than risk their jobs—allowing fraud, waste, and abuse to continue unchecked.
Moreover, the Executive Order ignores the root causes of dysfunction at the VA. Real accountability does not come from concentrating power in one office or giving top officials unchecked authority over personnel decisions. It comes from creating and supporting institutions that ensure fairness, transparency, and integrity—institutions that protect employees who do the right thing and expose wrongdoing.
As the Government Accountability Project warns, policies that purport to “reform” the VA but actually strip away whistleblower protections could backfire, worsening the very problems they claim to solve. “The VA has infamously generated over the past few decades more whistleblower complaints than most other major federal agencies and departments,” notes Louis Clark, Executive Director of the Government Accountability Project. “Given that unfortunate history, it is not helpful for this administration to devise policies that, while posing as reforms, might actually exacerbate the VA’s failure to adequately address employee concerns or put an end to retaliation.”
A VA where employees are afraid to speak out is a VA where mismanagement goes unchallenged, where critical flaws in care can persist, and where veterans—the very people the VA exists to serve—bear the consequences. It may be more productive for efforts to focus on whistleblower protections, external reviews and an overall culture of integrity instead of giving sweeping power to the VA Secretary.
If our nation is truly committed to “keeping promises to veterans,” we must ensure that those on the front lines of delivering care and services can raise their voices without fear—and that their concerns lead to real improvements, not retaliation. Anything less is not accountability. It’s a disservice to those who served.