January, 2025

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Congressional and Legislative Advocacy Update - 2024
Association of VA Social Workers (AVASW)

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Summary Highlights:
In February 2024 at the AVASW Strategic Planning meeting for the AVASW Executive
Committee the Congressional and Legislative Liaison gave a slide presentation of the
prior Legislative year. In March the Liaison participated and represented AVASW at the
2024 Legislative Roundtable in Washington, DC sponsored by NOVA (Nurse
Organization of the Veterans Administration. In March, the Liaison and AVASW
President met with Association of Veterans Affairs Psychology Leaders (AVAPL) and
American Psychology Association (APA) representative of APA discussing joint
legislative and other mutual concerns.

In May, with the filing of the Dole 21st Century Veterans Healthcare and Benefits and
Improvement Act, AVASW sent a letter of support for the bill to Mark Takano, Ranking
member, HVAC. This comprehensive bill provided benefits and services related to
healthcare, educational assistance, home loans, homelessness, and disability, and
memorial affairs. This bill passed by Congress and then signed by President Biden on
January 7, 2025.

 

In September 2024 Theophlius Watson was added as Legislative assistant working with
the Liaison.

In December 2024 and January 2025 AVASW joined in support with other veteran’s
advocacy support groups (Ie NOVA, AVAPL) in Statements of Support for key veteran’s
issues such as Community Care. These Statements of Support were sent to both the
House and Senate Veterans Affairs Committees.

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SOCIAL WORKERS IN CONGRESS
Social Workers have served in Congress since Jeannette Rankin (D) was
first elected to Congress in 1916 prior to Women’s Suffrage. She was from
Montana where women were given unrestricted voting rights in 1914. She
was a strong advocate for the 19 th Amendment which granted women the
right to vote nationwide.

 

2- In the 118th Congress there were five social workers in Congress. Two of
these social workers were in the Senate and 3 in the House of
Representatives. Debbie Stabenow (D) from Michigan has been a
Senator since 2000. She completed her 4 th term in 2024 and retired from
the U. S. Senate. Kyrsten Sinema (I) is a Senator from Arizona. She
served in the House from 2012 to 2018 and from 2018 to 2024 served in
the U. S. Senate. As a congressperson she worked actively on a social
work safety bipartisan bill. She retired in 2024.
In the House of Representatives there are three social workers. Barbara
Lee (D) is from California and has served the 13 th District since 1998 when
she replaced another social worker, Ron Dellums (D). She also served as
Chair of the Social Work Caucus and ran for the California U.S. Senate
seat in 2024. Sylvia Garcia (D) obtained a BA in Social from Texas
Women’s University and was among the first two Latinos elected from
Texas. The latest social worker to join Congress in 2022 was Hillary
Scholten (D) with a BA in Social Welfare from Gordon College.
119 th Congress
In January 2025 the 119th Congress begins, and we will see some changes. The
Congress is getting younger with the House of Representatives having a median age of
57.5 and the Senate a median age of 64.7. The House median age will be one year
younger and the Senate .5 year younger. We note that in the new House of
Representative the Baby Boomers are no longer the largest generation as Gen Xers
(born 65-80) are now the largest generational group. However, in the Senate, Boomers
(born 46-64) still are the largest group.

Veterans in 119th Congress
In the 1940s, veterans composed less than half of Congress. By the 1970s Veterans in
Congress peaked with the influx from World War II, Korea and the Vietnam War. In the
1970s more the three fourth of Congress had some form of military service. In the 119 th
Congress there will be 100 military veterans, and this is the largest in eight years.
There will be 16 new veterans and 84 incumbent veteran members of Congress. In
addition, the new Vice President (President of the Senate) (J. D. Vance) is a U. S.
Marine serving from 2003 to 2007 including a deployment to Iraq in 2005. In 2025 one
in every six members will be a veteran.

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3. Legislative Issues being Monitored-

AVASW will continue its mission of being an independent voice of VA Social Workers
advocating on behalf of veterans. Some of the issues we will monitor include:
Community Care – 1. Scheduling and Coordination. 2. Quality of healthcare within
VCCP, and 3. total cost of an unfettered community care program.

Whole Health Service:

Plans are in process to waive co-pays for “well-being“
healthcare to encourage veterans to look into services such as yoga, meditation,
wellness and counseling.

Safety:

Workplace Violence Prevention for Health Care and Social Service workers
Improving the Access to Mental Health – improve access to clinical social work service.

Improving Access to Advanced Care Planning:

Provide statutory authority for Medicare
coverage of Advance Care Planning service provided by clinical social workers.

Licensure Compact:

Allowing professionals to serve clients in every state that joins the
Compact.

Dental Care:

Currently dental care is only available on a limited basis. HR 210 would
furnish dental care in the same manner as any other medical service.

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Stanley G. Remer, MSW, MHA, LCSW
Congressional and Legislative Liaison
AVASW