Veterans and Family Information Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. JEFFRIES. Madam Speaker, I thank my good friend and classmate, Chairman Takano, for his tremendous leadership as well as the leadership of the ranking member and all of the distinguished members of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 2093, the Veterans and Family Information Act, a bipartisan bill that will serve those who have served our Nation with distinction. This commonsense legislation would improve non-English language accessibility for veterans, their families, and caregivers.

The Veterans Benefits Administration provides critical information to all veterans about their benefits that have been hard earned, including service-connected disability benefits, home loans, vocational rehabilitation, employment information, and how to access assistance for trauma.

For veterans of limited English proficiency, there is no guarantee that this critical information is made available in their primary language, thereby creating barriers for them and for their families.

As Chairman Takano indicated, there are over 500,000 foreign-born veterans that live in the United States, and additionally 1.9 million veterans who are the U.S.-born children of foreign-born parents.

Not only are our veterans increasingly diverse in terms of country of origin, but tens of thousands of veterans have self-identified to the VA that they speak English less than well.

In the most recent survey conducted, the VA also found that minorities, people of color, and language minorities comprise approximately 24 percent of the total veteran population in the United States.

Every single veteran deserves consistent, clear, and equal access to any and all information that the VA offers, regardless of their English proficiency. They have all served this country well.

The Veterans and Family Information Act would direct the Department of Veterans Affairs to make versions of all of its fact sheets available in the 10 most commonly spoken languages other than English in the United States, including Spanish and Tagalog.

I would like to thank the lead cosponsor of this bill, Representative Young Kim, for her extraordinary leadership and partnership in this effort, as well as, again, the chair, ranking member, and all of the distinguished members of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on H.R. 2093.

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