Solid Start Act of 2022

Floor Speech

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Mr. BOST. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in reluctant opposition to S. 1198, the Solid Start Act of 2021. The Solid Start program was created by President Trump in 2019 to better support veterans as they transition out of the military.

I know firsthand that leaving the military can be tough. When I left the military as a young marine, the only TAP program that I got was a tap on the back and a ``see ya later.''

I am glad that things have improved a lot since then. The Solid Start program has helped improve servicemembers' transitions even more.

I am a real big fan of the Solid Start program. The STRONG Act, my bill with Chairman Takano, includes identical language to this bill and would permanently authorize the Solid Start Program. The STRONG Act passed the House in June with my full support.

However, earlier this month, Secretary McDonough announced that VA would begin providing abortions. I believe it is not only immoral, but it is also illegal. Congress prohibited VA providing abortions in 1992. Congress has never repealed that prohibition. Just so you know, it has never been superseded.

Secretary McDonough has claimed that he is taking this action in defense of women's health, setting aside the fact that abortion is not healthcare. By making that claim, the Secretary has made it clear that he views women's health as one and the same with abortion.

Madam Speaker, this bill would require VA to provide women veterans with, ``information that is tailored to their specific healthcare and benefit needs.''

We have offered if they would remove that language to just say ``veterans,'' that would not include information about abortion, given the Secretary's views, that is unacceptable to me and to many others.

Our democracy is based on the rule of law, and I wish the Secretary would follow the law, especially when it is a matter of life and death. If he did, I would fully support this bill just like I did in June, before the VA's new illegal rule.

Instead, I regret that I must oppose it today, and I urge my colleagues to oppose the bill.

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Mr. BOST. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume because I would like to take this time to respond to a few things that were not said correctly.

One, no one has said anything about a lawsuit, especially from the ranking member.

Two, the Hyde amendment says: rape, incest, life of the mother. When you put life and health of the mother, then it expands what can be distorted and where we are at, and it opens to the point of long-term abortion, and that has actually been verified by the VA.

There is not a whole list there that we want to remove. We want it to say: If we believe that men and women are all veterans and should be considered, then they should be advised as veterans.

But by putting that particular language in at this time after the administration has violated the law of 1962--now the chairman said there is another law, but if you look at that law, that law never goes directly to abortion. And if it was directed towards abortion, then they would have put it in the law. They would have put it in the law. They wouldn't have made that broad statement. That is why it is a misinterpretation of the VA.

Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith).

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Madam Speaker, I thank my good friend for yielding.

Madam Speaker, as the former chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs and the prime author of 14 major laws to assist veterans, including the Homeless Veterans Comprehensive Assistance Act and several healthcare laws as well, I have always deeply respected and strongly supported the unique mission of VA healthcare.

Comprised of 172 medical centers and over 1,100 outpatient clinics, the VA operates the largest integrated healthcare network in the entire world. VA medical personnel--371,000 professionals and support staff-- are absolutely committed to healing, nurturing, and rehabilitating.

So it is beyond disappointing that President Biden issued an illegal rule--I was here when section 106 of the Veterans Healthcare Act of 1992 was enacted, and it couldn't have been clearer--to turn the lifesaving, life-enhancing mission of the VA into new venues for abortion on demand.

And the word health--Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton couldn't have made it more clear, and Doe v. Bolton with the companion opinion issued by the Supreme Court, they defined health. They used the World Health Organization's definition, and it is everything including any kind of mental stress. So it is completely wide-open, abortion-on-demand language. It is not rape, incest, and life of the mother. Health is included in Biden's rule.

The new Biden VA abortion rule authorizes and forces taxpayers to fund the violent death of unborn baby girls and baby boys by what?

By beheading, dismemberment, forced expulsion from the womb, deadly poisons, and other methods at any time until birth.

Abortion, Madam Speaker, is not healthcare unless one construes the precious life of an unborn child to be analogous to a tumor to be excised or a disease to be vanquished.

For decades, Madam Speaker, abortion advocates have gone to extraordinary lengths to ignore, trivialize, and cover up the battered baby victim. But today, thanks to ultrasound, unborn babies are more visible than ever before. Today, science informs us that birth is an event--albeit an important one--but it is not the beginning of life. Modern science and medicine today treats unborn children with disability or disease as a patient in need of diagnosis and treatment, not death by abortion.

Unborn babies are society's youngest patients and deserve benign, life-affirming medical interventions and not medicines that kill. The weakest and most vulnerable unborn babies deserve our respect, empathy, protection, and love.

The legislation before us today will be used to promote the VA's new abortion-on-demand mission.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose it, and, hopefully, we will see a change in the policy sometime in the near future that President Biden has issued.
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Mr. BOST. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Let me tell you, Madam Speaker, if I may, the question is not on rape, incest, or life of the mother. It is on health, which could then go to mental health which could spin off to late-term abortions.

This is a very personal issue to a lot of people, and I am sure it is to everyone on both sides of the aisle. But I have to question who in this room has ever held a child who has been born after 25 weeks in the womb? I have. I held one granddaughter who died in the womb and one who died in my arms after she was out of the womb.

What the VA has done with this rule by tweaking it, they think it is for the right reasons--right or wrong--which you consider, rape, incest, life of the mother, it is not. It is rape, incest, life and health of the mother, which will allow for those late-term abortions.

Madam Speaker, that is life. Our Constitution is very clear. It is very clear: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, the first being life.

You can't, if you have ever held a child like that when they died in your arms, say that is not life.

Unfortunately, it is not us that is making the decision. It is political. It is the Biden administration, Madam Speaker, and they have done it through taking the VA.

Anybody that can question me on my support of veterans is out of their mind. I have served. My father served. My grandfather served. My son served. My grandson served. And guess what? As of last week, my granddaughter is now in Navy boot camp.

I will stand for the veterans, but I will not stand for the death of children regardless of who this administration is or what they believe is a good political move.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy), my good friend.

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Mr. BOST. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I think it is important to realize that DOD actually follows the Hyde amendment, which is rape, incest, and the life of the mother, which is exactly what the chairman just quoted.

What the VA does is rape, incest, and life and health, including mental health, of the mother, which can be a claim that maybe I am under stress, all of these things. That is why we need clarification. Not only do we need clarification, but we need to follow the law.

The argument that the other law allows the VA Secretary to make these decisions, it never mentioned abortion in there. I think that would have done that.

Madam Speaker, I am encouraging my Members to vote ``no'' on this bill. I would love to be able to vote on this bill when we get this problem straightened out. I believe our veterans deserve to have the other benefits that are here and available in the bill.

As everybody knows, I did vote for it in the other form before the VA stepped down this path.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. BOST. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

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