CNN "State of the Union with Candy Crowley" - Transcript

Interview

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CROWLEY: Joining me is the Chairwoman of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, Patty Murray in Washington. Senator, thank you for being here.

MURRAY: Great to be here.

CROWLEY: Memorial Day is such a great day to talk about those that were lucky enough to come home. But how they are being served by the population as a whole. We now have sequestration. That is an agreement that there would be huge cuts in the defense and non- discretionary domestic spending if Congress couldn't act on their own to get an equal amount of cuts. How will that affect veterans benefits?

MURRAY: Well first of all let me thank you for doing this to really focus the country where we should be on Memorial Day. On those men and women who have served us. Those who have lost a family member, we can never forget. And those who come home, we've got to make sure we're doing everything we can. So, I really appreciate it. Sequestration is something that all of us have to be concerned about. We've got some real big decisions coming at us.

We believe that veterans benefits are protected under that, as they should be. Because we have asked these men and women to go to war. They should not be making the sacrifice.

CROWLEY: So you're -- you're thinking that they won't be touched as is. So I guess the next question is, as is, are the veterans benefits and the increases they've asked for in the next budget enough?

MURRAY: Well I think that's an interesting question to answer. Because they're -- it -- it's -- it ties not just to the benefits that they've getting, or supposed to get, but -- which we will have budgeted for. But, are they getting it in a timely way? Are they getting accurate benefits? Are we correctly diagnosing PTSD as they leave the military? Are we doing everything we can to make sure that they get access to the -- their benefits in the right kind of way, fast? So it's -- it's resources, but it's a lot bigger.

CROWLEY: And -- and my -- my guess is that your answer to all those questions is, no?

MURRAY: My answer to every question you would ask me about veterans today versus a year ago, is we've made progress. We have a long ways to go and we cannot forget.

CROWLEY: Except for, is it progress? Because now I guess the -- we have a new report out that the waiting -- the backlog first of all is over -- about 900,000 disability benefit applications. So the backlog is closing in on a million for Heaven's sakes. And that the waiting period can be more than a year?

MURRAY: Yeah. You know that...

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CROWLEY: Is that acceptable? MURRAY: No, it's not acceptable. It -- it doesn't meet the guidelines of the V.A. It doesn't meet what the country expects. And it has a serious impact on a veteran who is waiting to get a benefit check to pay -- put food on the table or pay for their mortgage or just do basic things in their life. So it is unacceptable. There -- there is the...

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CROWLEY; Don't we say that...

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CROWLEY: ...I guess the frustration is, I feel like you and I and certainly you have worked on this for -- for far longer than I have reported on this. And the question is, why doesn't anything ever seem to change much?

MURRAY: You know, it -- it is such a complex problem. And I -- I'm not going to give anybody excuses. But I do need to remind all of us that the injuries that our soldiers are coming home with today, what they are living through that previous generations of warriors did not survive? Are very complex. But that doesn't mean we should not be doing what we can do. Or...

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CROWLEY: More are surviving.

MURRAY: Yeah.

CROWLEY: That's the good news.

MURRAY: More are surviving.

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CROWLEY: ...we're not taking care of them well enough.

MURRAY: They're complex. They're complex cases. So rating them and getting the right disability rating is complex. But that means we need to have people who are trained up and -- and we were not prepared for a war that's lasted this long with that many soldiers who have had repeated deployments.

CROWLEY: I guess that's people's frustration with the government though is though as the war went on, someone should have been thinking, this war could go on for a while and it will mean that we'll have X many more veterans.

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MURRAY: I've been screaming about that forever.

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CROWLEY: With these sorts of...

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CROWLEY: ...absolutely. And I think now we have something that sounds so simple. At the -- the V.A. and the Department of Defense have different rating systems for the disabilities. Now why can't someone just say, you know choose one? Pick one?

MURRAY: I met with a soldier, a sergeant who had three -- was it three IED explosions? Served in Iraq and Afghanistan, was suffering from post traumatic stress syndrome. Was diagnosed by the Army for that. But then when he went to get out of the service they said, oh you were lying. You're a malingerer. You didn't have anything wrong. You're making this up. Can you imagine somebody who has the courage to say I'm having issues is told they're a liar? He was dismissed from the Army and not given the benefits he's earned. We have fought back, not just for him but for hundreds of people now who were misdiagnosed coming out of the Army.

They're now going back and doing a total review, but I am seriously worried about the hundreds of men and women who have left our military with an incorrect diagnosis. We have got to get this right. The Army is starting to do it. We need to do it across all services.

CROWLEY: Is just with mental health, whether it's TBI, traumatic brain injury or PTSD or other sorts of stresses that are brought on by combat or by being in the arena, is there enough money set aside to deal with what -- I mean, there's almost half a million we're looking at of veterans returning or soldiers returning that will suffer from some form of PTSD.

MURRAY: Yes, this is a question our country needs to come to grips with. This is not just going to be what do we need next year or what do we need as we pull out our soldiers from Iraq, but the costs of 10 years of war on a specific population are going to be felt for decades.

And we need to say, do we have the resources in this country to provide for those men and women and their families for a long time to come? And that question hasn't been answered. (CROSSTALK)

CROWLEY: Is there a no to that question, though, just quickly? Do we have the resources? We can't afford not to have them, can we?

MURRAY: I think we have to absolutely be on top of this and asking that question. You know, we're in this time period where everybody says I don't want to pay any more, I don't want to be involved. We sent our troops to war without paying for it. Now we're bringing them home without saying how we're going to pay for it. That's going to hurt every American in the future.

CROWLEY: Senator Patty Murray, thank you, on Memorial Day. We appreciate your time. MURRAY: Thank you.

CROWLEY: Tackling the hidden wounds of war. That's next.

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