Veterans Readiness and Employment Improvement Act of 2025

Floor Speech

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Mr. OBERNOLTE. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 980.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman and my friend and colleague from Wisconsin (Mr. Van Orden) for including my bill, H.R. 913, the Streamlining Aviation for Eligible Veterans Act, in the text of this bill.

This bill will make meaningful improvements to the way that the VR&E program serves our disabled veterans, and my section of the bill will enable those veterans to use their VR&E benefits to pursue vocational flight training.

Mr. Speaker, as you know, we have a nationwide pilot shortage, and our veterans make excellent candidates for pilots, having been trained in a highly technical environment and being trained to follow the rules and being able to absorb all of the knowledge necessary to be an exceptional pilot.

Mr. Speaker, there currently are impediments for VR&E benefits being used in vocational flight training. These benefits are intended, as currently written, to be used in programs that are degree granting. As we all know, earning a college degree has nothing to do necessarily with learning how to fly an aircraft.

This bill will improve that section by granting the VA the flexibility to have veterans pursue vocational flight training outside of degree-granting programs.

Mr. Speaker, that will not only incentivize our servicemen and -women to become pilots and to embark on new careers, but it will also help to solve the nationwide pilot shortage in our country. Most importantly, it puts our veterans first.

Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on H.R. 980.

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