Veterans Rapid Retraining Assistance Program Restoration and Recovery Act of 2022

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of S. 4089, the Veterans Rapid Retraining Assistance Program Restoration and Recovery Act.

One of the few positive provisions that was enacted as part of the American Rescue Plan was the creation of the Veteran Rapid Retraining Assistance Program, or VRRAP. This program authorizes 1 year of GI Bill-style education benefits for training for an in-demand occupation for unemployed veterans.

VRRAP was originally authored during the peak of COVID veteran unemployment by our former colleague Dr. Phil Roe and Congressman Levin. I was pleased to introduce the bill this year and was glad that it was made part of the American Rescue Plan.

Under this program, eligible veterans only have one chance to participate in VRRAP. This became a problem for hundreds of students at Future Tech Career Institute in Chicago when the training provider lost their ability to administer GI Bill benefits earlier this year.

If those students had been using a traditional GI Bill program, they would be eligible to have their benefits restored to continue their studies at another school. However, with VRRAP, that was not possible.

This bill will fix that issue, authorizing VRRAP users to have another chance to use the program if their school closes or loses GI Bill approval in the middle of the semester.

While I am very supportive of the policy in this bill, I do have concerns about the cost. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated the cost of this bill to be at $6 million in mandatory costs over 10 years.

For whatever reason, the Senate chose not to offset these costs before passing this bill. This decision is, unfortunately, not surprising, as we have seen repeatedly that the Democrat majority in both the House and the Senate loves to ignore costs and increase spending.

Their overstimulation of the economy has led to soaring inflation and staggering price increases that Americans see every day. We must stop mortgaging our children's and grandchildren's futures. Our current level of spending is simply not sustainable.

That being said, I am not going to stand in the way of providing restored benefits to unemployed veterans who need our help in this struggling economy. That is why I am going to reluctantly support the passage of this bill today. However, I caution my friends that this practice of un-offset spending must end.

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Mr. BOST. Mr. Speaker, I encourage my colleagues to support this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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