U.S. Secretary of Veterans Affairs Doug Collins joins Glenn Beck to review some of the major changes he’s making at the VA, including the possible approval of alternative medicine. For too long, veterans have felt that the VA has failed them. But Secretary Collins promises that’s “not going to be acceptable” anymore.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Doug Collins is with us. He's with the US secretary of Veterans Affairs. Can we privatize the VA? What's being done with the VA? We talk to Doug Collins in 60 seconds. First, let me tell you about the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. When you give to the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, you're just not making a donation, you're providing essential support to Israel's most vulnerable. And your contribution helps deliver food to the hungry, medicine to the sick, and shelter to those who are displaced by conflict. Again, perfect and the possible. The perfect is everything, you know, goes back to what it should be, where we're all living peacefully, next to one another. That's not really possible, right now. But here's what is possible: If I help, maybe -- maybe we can strengthen the Jewish people to fight their own wars, and we don't have to get involved in it. Let them do their own stuff, so we don't have to get involved. If we want the government to do less, that means we have to do more. And I want to support the good people of Israel. I believe the Bible commands us to do it, or, you know, at least highly recommends it by saying, I will bless those who bless you.

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Doug Collins is joining us now. US Secretary of Veterans Affairs. Doug, how are you, sir?

DOUG: I'm good, Glenn. How about you?

GLENN: I'm really good. I can't thank you for everything you guys are doing at the VA. I mean, I just think there are so many of our veterans that have been treated so miserably, they're killing themselves, like they've never -- never done before. I mean, I -- I know that you heard some of the things that we've talked about here, where, you know, people are just killing themselves trying to -- you know, trying to make a point, that we've got to -- the VA is -- it is in dire need of transformation. So thank you for caring, and thank you for doing everything you are to transform it.

DOUG: I appreciate it. I appreciate it. There's a lot.

GLENN: Can we get out of this? How can we get and privatize as much as of this as we can?

DOUG: Well, I think the issue of privatization is probably not the right answer in this. I think what we have is, is we have the tools that President Trump and I, frankly have worked on when I was in Congress, a couple years ago. Was actually beginning to make this system less about the VA, and more about the veterans. And that is getting care out of the centralization services all the time.

Everything having to do with coming to our hospital, but using our community. One of the big issues that's always brought up is privatization. It's a valid conversation, but it's not something we're looking at.

Mainly because, the thing gets separated so much from the VA is the VA has the other issue, the same issues as the private and the public hospital, and that's in recruitment doctors, a lot of other things going on.

But then the specialty nature of what's going on with them. The big thing we can do.

One, I think we can streamline this issue. To save money. That's what we're looking to do.

Literally, hundreds of millions of dollars of bad contracts. Bad subsidies. But it's the same as getting the veterans, especially those that you just talked about a minute ago, which are on my heart.

That are coming into a system that is not listening to their needs, and then in turn, believing there is nowhere else to turn for them, and many of them are taking their own life. And that's just something that will not be acceptable in anything.

But we're finally asking the right questions. And putting the -- the community. And our private doctors. Our public doctors, to help get these veterans the help they need.

GLENN: Okay. So let's talk about a couple of things that you are doing.

You know, you had a massive backlog of cases. And you've brought -- you've brought that backlog down over 25 percent in 100 days. What did you do? And what does it mean, to the veterans?

DOUG: Well, it means. It's several things. What it means is leadership. That what gets measured gets done. I think there was an accountability factor that we have. And I brought that to us now, an accountability factor that says, you will either do your job, or you will not work for us.

And so 260,000 backlogs. Let me explain what that means. So 260,000 cases of people asking or applying for benefits -- disability benefits, that went over 125 days. Okay? It should never have been there.

260,000. We've cut that to under 200,000, maybe 108.

We've also begun, because that is now freeing up work. We're now actually processing more. And you remember the greater scenario, that all the mainstream media, the New York Times, and the Post said, if you brought people back to work, it would be terrible.

It would be awful. We actually are processing more claims per day right now, than we ever have in our history. We actually are processing more than we are getting in, for the first time in a long time. What it took was simply saying, no, you're going to do this. It's not a choice anymore.

What I inherited, a department, in which -- how do you say it? If it feels good, do it. You know, everybody was just operating on their own time zones. And I said, we're not going to do that anymore. The VA is going to actually be about the veterans. So that's how we've done it, and it makes the difference. And not calling your congressman. Or calling everybody else. They're getting what they've earned, and we're fulfilling that promise

GLENN: So help me out on this. You know, we reached out to you and your team after I interviewed a dad from San Antonio last night, whose son Mark took his own life in April, right in front of the VA hospital. Because he believed he didn't receive adequate care for pain he was having. Mental health issues, et cetera, et cetera.

Speak to the dad who feels like the VA has failed his son, and what you're trying to do to make this right.

DOUG: I will just as I did one night, I was actually on with him. And it shows you a difference, Glenn. I do whatever I can, to say, look, when we're doing it wrong. Or we're doing an issue, that we need to at least address. And in this situation, I think this is something that we need to address. And I did this with him before. Is my heart hurts. And I think it shows that the problem we have in our system, that has drug itself into a point, where we have just sort of handled the mental health process.

We've handled the traumatic brain injury. The PTS issue. In such a way, that this is sort of the way we do it.

And, you know, I've got -- I'm telling our doctors. I'm telling our folks that we partner with, nonprofits and others, saying, we have to try something different. We're not moving the needle.

Since 2008, the suicide number has not changed in this country, and yet we're spending $588 million or more, every year, to quote, prevent it. But yet, in our services, still treating it many times with medicine.

We have got to do a better job of getting more counseling in there. We're getting more clinical. But also something -- I took from -- we've been looking at from many of our veterans groups and others, including folks we've been dealing with.

With Bobby Kennedy as well, and HHS. We're looking at alternative medicine. We're looking at possible use of psychedelics, along with counseling.

Anything we can, to get them the help that they need, so they don't feel like the VA is not listening to them. Or they're getting handed a bottle of pills. And that's something we don't need to be looking at.

They need to be getting help, and not just a medical condition.

GLENN: I mean, it's -- it's interesting to me. That the Germans look -- handed a lot of their soldiers, bottles of pills. So that they can fight, fight, fight, fight. And become animals. And we train our people differently. Humanely. But we train our people to be able to go in and pull the trigger when they have to.

But is it fair to say, we spend all that money doing that. But when they come home, we don't spend enough money and enough time to try to deprogram that. To bring them back into our society, and how to deal with all the stuff that they were trained to do.

Is that fair?

DOUG: Yeah. I think it's a fair assumption. And I think it's also the changing face of warfare. And I'll quit in just a moment here. In World War II, I had, you know, I've had -- they went with only two things in mind. They were either going to win or come home dead.

They had no time frame to come home.

As war as progressed. Now, it's -- you bring it up the last 20 years.

That you have generations.

Less than -- about one and a half percent of population, have participated in foreign soil, in the battle. But we've done it over and over and over again.

So what we're having, these folks, four to six, eight years who have all this stuff built up. We have broken them down to become the soldier, the marine, that we needed.

GLENN: The machine.

DOUG: The machine, and then they come back out, and when they're doing so much, they never have time to process. And for some of them, they get out within four, to six, to eight years. This is something that is not enough time to get into the system. To say, this is how I copy. So you've hit it exactly, in the sense that we're not spending the time in the transition.

This is why Secretary of Defense and I, on an unprecedented level, it did not happen that we found before, where us, as secretaries sat down and said, we've got a transition problem.

And so it's owned by the DOD. They do the transition of something coming out. If anything happens, then I get blamed for it. So I just don't think -- we've got to fix this. We've got to start working -- it may be -- you may own it. But I get blamed for it, and I'm not going to get blamed for something I can't do.

So right now, we're working on getting that transition better so we have a warm handoff, especially for those who are hurting already, to come into our system, and receive all of -- you know, white glove treatment, where they're coming in with a warm handoff, so they have a better chance of affecting change. And here's another thing.

I open it back up, to where we're going to parter with nonprofits. We will partner with groups, that are already doing good stuff.

And instead of us wasting money that we don't need. I will use other groups that are already in this arena to say, help us here. And connect them with --

GLENN: Yeah. It always -- it kills me.

When you have something. For instance, in a different subject.

When you have something like AA. That works. That always works.

And then you find these people, who are running these centers. Who are like, well, we're going to change it. We will do our own thing.

It's like, but that works. Why not just do that?

It's free! Why not just do that?

DOUG: Glenn, you would be amazed what I see here.

We're already starting to fix. And so, you know, we're taking out -- so that our doctors aren't having to go through a second opinion or third opinion, to get somebody to the help they need.

We now actually will be taking amputees. I have real experience with this. My daughter is in a wheelchair.

We will make them going to primary care. To PTs. Before they could just get reset for a new chair.

That's bullcrap. We're cutting that out. So they get a better experience.

We give them the earned respect that they have.

GLENN: Oh, my goodness.

You know, a lot of critics, Democrat lawmakers, especially look at the proposed 15 percent staff reduction, that you -- you know, are -- are championing here.

And they're saying, that will lead to a shortage of doctors and nurses.

How do you plan to protect the front line health care services for veterans and cut 15 percent of staff?

DOUG: Well, first off, the 15 percent is the goal.

That was something the president, we will see what you can do.

And if you don't set a goal, nothing gets done, Glenn.

Your listeners know that.

Can you do that? If you can, how do you do that?

What we did, we knew, and the president knew it, the VA is a really unique organization. With all this everyday facing department, that we have dealing with the medical kind of conditions that we deal with. So what we did early on, we said, we won't put in jeopardy, doctors and nurses, that the Democrats and others are lying about. We protected over 300,000 positions within our health care system and our disability rating system, that said, look, you're not even eligible to take an early retirement.

You're not eligible.

Because we're not going to cut the various things that we need.

But I've got literally thousands of other employees, on duplicated HR processes, contracting processes.

You know, human resource processes.

I mean, I was amazed here. And I talk about a permissive attitude.

We were supposed to centralize our payroll several years ago. The previous administration said, no. You want to -- I figured out, we had over 60 locations doing their own payroll!

GLENN: What!

DOUG: And a lot bigger expense. So this -- look, here's what has come up. Everybody talking about -- GAO has said, for ten years, we've been (inaudible). The Democrats, Republicans, everybody on the Hill, and I've said this in my hearings, all of you, I can show you comments where you say you want efficiency, you want the VA to work better. And yet the first moment I start saying, here's some changes that need to be made, then all of a sudden, it's about the worker. Well, I believe our VA workers are great folks. The VA is not a jobs program. The VA is a service organization.

And we're changing that mindset.

GLENN: Have you thought of -- I'm sure you have. But have you thought of doing things like in a private company, you know, I like to incentivize people and say, hey. We are way overbudget. Or we're trying to make this a better process one way or another.

Just tell us. And then we'll give you the employee, you know, a kickback, or a bonus, or whatever. If that works. And it came from you.

Have you thought about incentivizing the people to streamline, and to save?

DOUG: Yeah. We're looking at that. I've been saying it everywhere I go.

Identify been in 16 states. In our facilities, that I'm not even close to halfway yet.

Everywhere I go, that's exactly what I'm telling them.

Unfortunately, I'm bound on how I can offer incentives and such.

Also offering and saying, hey. How can we make this better?

I found that you empower American workers, Glenn. You empower our American people to do good. They will do good.

When you believe in them, like I believe in them. And say, I want you to go be the best that you can be. And if you see something stupid, you let us know. And we'll fix it.

They will go out and do things.

Also, here's the other alternative. Also, good people aren't working where bad people are tolerated.

And we're making it very much an emphasis to get rid of bad people who are not wanting to do good things. It used to be a culture of failure up here.

Or a failure sideways. If you failed, we just put you somewhere over the top.

That stopped, the minute I came in.

And we're getting rid of people who can't do the job.

GLENN: Doug, I really appreciate it.

I love the fact that you're a servant of the Lord. And, you know, so I know your priorities are right, and that's on people.

So thank you for what you're doing. We appreciate you.

DOUG: I appreciate it. Anything you need, you let me know, okay?

GLENN: You got it. Doug Collins. US Secretary of Veterans Affairs.