Saturday, February 28, 2015
Los Angeles Times: Really? The secretary of Veterans Affairs? Surely there is no one who should better understand how offensive it is to lie about one’s military service than the secretary of Veterans Affairs. Yet that’s exactly what Robert McDonald did the night he participated in the Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count in January. While chatting with a homeless man on skid row who said he had served in the elite special forces, McDonald responded, “Special forces? What years? I was in special forces.”
In fact, McDonald, who graduated from West Point and did serve in the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, was never a member of special forces.
APOLOGY
This week, he apologized, saying he “reacted spontaneously.” The White House described his claim as a “misstatement” and said he “never intended to misrepresent his military service.”
The secretary has his work cut out for him to earn back the trust of veterans frustrated by his department’s recent scandal over months-long wait times for care and its bad record of caring for veterans. But it doesn’t seem too much to ask that when directly engaging with veterans, he does so honestly.