Tester Pushes VA to Publish Rule Change for Veteran Caregivers

(Big Sandy, Mont.) - Continuing his efforts to support veterans and their caregivers, Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee Chairman Jon Tester is calling on the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to publish a pending Program of Comprehensive Assistance for Family Caregivers (PCAFC) proposed rule, which is anticipated to expand eligibility for the program.

In April 2023, President Biden issued an Executive Order to encourage VA to make appropriate modifications to the eligibility criteria of PCAFC by the end of 2023. In his letter to VA Secretary Denis McDonough, Tester wrote: "At that time, I encouraged VA to ensure stakeholder engagement in the process of developing comprehensive criteria that would include all populations of caregivers and veterans, including legacy participants enrolled on or before September 30, 2020. Now, nearly a year later, veterans and caregivers are still waiting."

Tester continued: "Since the suspension of dismissals of legacy participants is ending by September 30, 2025, veterans and caregivers are concerned they may be dropped from PCAFC without changes to the program. Additionally, a change in the presidential administration next year may cause further delays. I hear regularly from constituents that uncertainty about the future of PCAFC impacts their financial and emotional well-being."

Tester led the fight for years to expand PCAFC to veterans of all eras-successfully including language in the bipartisan VA MISSION Act of 2018to do so. However, in 2020 VA defied Congress' intent and the concerns of veterans and caregivers by enacting regulations that narrowed the program's eligibility to veterans with a 70 percent or higher service-connected disability rating, and those with an inability to perform an activity of daily living without assistance each and every time the activity occurs.

Since the implementation of the restrictive regulations, Tester has continuously raised concerns and called on the Department to fix its eligibility criteria for PCAFC. Following Tester's efforts, VA started making sweeping changes to the program in March of 2022, including immediately halting the discharge of legacy participants and working to start a new process to refine eligibility requirements to ensure the program is meeting the intent of Congress.

In June, Tester also led a hearing to receive firsthand testimony about the impact of the restrictive regulations on veterans and their caregivers. The Senators heard from a Montanan who serves as a caregiver for her husband, a Post-9/11 veteran. Her husband's combat injuries resulted in a 100 percent permanent and total disability rating by the Veterans Benefits Administration in 2016, but after a reassessment by the PCAFC program in 2021, he was dropped from the program despite his condition remaining the same.

Tester concluded the letter: "VA continues to be a leader in supporting caregivers and veterans through PCAFC and other caregiver programs, but various changes made to the program have led to a loss in trust among those veterans and caregivers in the legacy cohort. This Administration has worked to redevelop that trust and must now publish the pending PCAFC proposed rule to ensure veterans and their family caregivers can plan for the future."

Read the full text of the letter HERE.