Days Into Trump Admin, Corrupt Employees Are Already Being Fired At The VA

Meanwhile, at the troubled Veteran's Administration, we finally have action being taken to drain that swamp. Starting on January 20th, the firings have begun........

Days into Donald Trump’s administration, heads are finally beginning to roll at the Department of Veterans Affairs. Two notoriously corrupt employees in Puerto Rico were fired this week, indicating that more may be on the way. One is the hospital’s CEO, DeWayne Hamlin, who offered an employee $305,000 to quit after she played a role in exposing his drug arrest. “Mr. DeWayne Hamlin was removed from federal service effective January 20, 2017,” the VA said. Jan. 20 was Inauguration Day.

But wait, there's more!!!

Paperwork reviewed by The Daily Caller News Foundation shows that bosses openly told Rosayma Lopez that she was being fired for refusing to fabricate a reason to fire another employee, Joseph Colon, after he exposed that Hamlin had been arrested at 3 a.m. in Florida on suspicion of drunk driving while in possession of pills for which he had no prescription. Diversion of opiates from VA facilities is a major issue. After ethics officials blocked that firing, he attempted to pay her to quit using $305,000 of taxpayer money, which would have been the largest settlement in recent VA history. She refused the money.

So, even though the investigation began in earnest last year, the newly incoming administration seems to have prompted and supported actively draining this area of the swamp, and is actually doing it. From ridding the VA of felons, registered sex offenders, and even one employee that was sentenced to jail and was still employed and collecting pay while incarcerated! It's all in the full article here...
Link to full article


I say, let's make the VA great for ONCE! Our veterans deserve it, and it is LONG overdue.

originally posted by: Krakatoa
Meanwhile, at the troubled Veteran's Administration, we finally have action being taken to drain that swamp. Starting on January 20th, the firings have begun........

I say, let's make the VA great for ONCE! Our veterans deserve it, and it is LONG overdue.

Great post OP. Trump is keeping his word on making sure that funds to the VA are being distributed fairly and honorably to those who have served the US so greatly and have been treated so badly.

It is now payback to those who fell corrupt and who held their positions for too long. Get 'em the hell outta here!

a reply to: Krakatoa

Next to having the Affordable Care Act penalty tax addressed, nothing pleases me more than seeing the bright light of reform shine on the despicable and deplorable conditions our Vets are subjected to within the VA.

The other person fired recently is a woman who took part in an armed robbery, then kept her job while she was in jail, and continued to work in the hospital’s security office while wearing an ankle bracelet.

wow

Braxton Linton is a high-level manager in charge of buying prosthetics such as hearing aids, often with government-issued credit cards. He was hired just weeks after release from federal prison for stealing $70,000 using credit card info he lifted from his previous employer

what could possibly go wrong by hiring him for that job?

a reply to: Tardacus
This one is also a WTF moment.......

Rapists and kidnappers also work at nearby hospitals. An Ohio VA employee, Antoine Hall, was convicted of creating pornography depicting a 13-year old in 2014. Hall is wearing a VA badge around his neck in the sex offender registry picture, meaning he was still going to work after being sentenced, and even received a bonus in 2015.

See, the actions of a pack reflect the actions of the pack leader. When a pack leader ignores corruption, it is a defacto acceptance of those actions and they increase. When a pack leader cracks down on that same behavior, it puts everyone on notice that is not acceptable and behaviors change.

We have had a weak pack leader for 8 years, time for a strong pack leader willing to make the hard decisions and accept the criticisms from every angle.

Think of the veterans! Some waiting months to years to be seen and treated for their ailments (physical and mental). They honored us, we damned well better start honoring them.

a reply to: Krakatoa

I don`t believe that these were the best applicants for the jobs, why would the VA hire people like these?

originally posted by: Tardacus
a reply to: Krakatoa

I don`t believe that these were the best applicants for the jobs, why would the VA hire people like these?

See my previous post above yours. That answers your question right there. Because they can, and crooks like to hang out with crooks...and it seems also work with them if not called out on it and taken to task (like the rest of us would be).

a reply to: Krakatoa

It just makes you sick, doesn't it.

Waste, fraud, abuse, misuse! Trump has been a huge advocate for cleaning up the VA. We have been living with corrupt, inept, and clueless leadership for far too long. We finally have someone that targets the problem, formulates the solution, and implements the remedy!

a reply to: Tardacus


Pills....a vet is prescribed the highest limit and given half the dose, this leaves heaps to sell on the lucrative black market. As long as the prescription issues ,matches the stock during an audit the cash rolls in.

originally posted by: anonentity
a reply to: Tardacus


Pills....a vet is prescribed the highest limit and given half the dose, this leaves heaps to sell on the lucrative black market. As long as the prescription issues ,matches the stock during an audit the cash rolls in.

I bet this kind of crap goes on all over the country. Again, are politicians and government bureaucrats just too damn lazy to get the job done that has needed to be done for years!?

The VA has a lot of good legitimate hospitals. Their budget is not big enough to hire extra good doctors though, the government seems to want to transfer the money to regular doctors and does not flinch at the extra costs occurring with their doing so. My uncles and Stepfather and some older friends used the VA facility once in a while. The doctors there reviewed their meds and took them off of some of them they were taking and they started to get better. After a few months of getting better, their regular doctors talked them into starting the meds again and they went downhill again. Back to the VA and they again took them off the same meds again and they started to feel good again untill their regular doctor represcribed them again. They were being overmedicated. They were being told to restrict salt too, and they got weak from restricting salt too.

They are all dead now, finally not wanting to bother anyone to take them to the VA. I like the VA doctors, they recognize quality of life is important. My uncles Heart surgeon told him to not take anymore meds but the doctor who oversaw his meds when he left the hospital talked him into taking him again and he went downhill again. He was doing so good without the meds, just a baby aspirin. His mind was clearer than it had been in many years. We heard the doctors nurses that day talking about the doctor getting a free trip to the Bahamas when we were waiting for the doctor to come, they were enlightened that their doctor got a free trip from the Pharma companies and they were talking about his other trips he took before too, one just six months ago. Ten medicines were prescribed, six new ones.

a reply to: Krakatoa

Reading through this just makes me sick. This is not the way it works in private or even public traded health facilities.

There is something very sick about this and it makes you wonder how high up it goes. They used to say it was the union agreement. Apparently it is much deeper. Obvious reasons to remove an employee yet it isn't done.

Really want to see what is done higher up the ladder. if nothing then it is just for show. It is usually top down. Get rid of the top.

originally posted by: liveandlearn
a reply to: Krakatoa

Reading through this just makes me sick. This is not the way it works in private or even public traded health facilities.

There is something very sick about this and it makes you wonder how high up it goes. They used to say it was the union agreement. Apparently it is much deeper. Obvious reasons to remove an employee yet it isn't done.

Really want to see what is done higher up the ladder. if nothing then it is just for show. It is usually top down. Get rid of the top.

Agreed, on all points. And, as of January 20th, we did get rid of the top of the ladder.

Maybe there is some sort of tie-in with a prison rehabilitation program or something that gets to place ex-cons in places to keep their numbers looking good. I can't think of much else.

originally posted by: Tardacus
a reply to: Krakatoa

I don`t believe that these were the best applicants for the jobs, why would the VA hire people like these?

a reply to: Krakatoa

About time.... Applause!

waiting for this to be twisted in Trump being satan incarnate yet again somehow. Kinda like was attempted with Louisiana.

a reply to: Krakatoa

Trump made it abundantly clear that the Veterans will never again be neglected, and first you get rid of the vermin from within the VA, then undo anything which adversely effects the ongoing and full protection and support of military Vets.

If Trump can change this, he will likely amass the largest military in modern history by virtue of post-combat support alone. Hell, if you give your life for you country and the protection of her citizens and happen to live to tell the tale, the government and civilians owe you everything for doing so.....including full ceremony with military honours upon your burial.

Drain that swamp...

a reply to: Krakatoa

Excellent thread. Thank you for posting. S&F for you, my friend.

a reply to: Krakatoa

This is good stuff Bro! Thanks for bringing it to the table!
Stars for everyone and flag for you

a reply to: liveandlearn

Yep....and it begins from the time a vet is a day one private.

The mental game they play kinda goes like this: You are highly encouraged to seek medical attention if you need it out one side of their mouth, and out the other you are all but accused of malingering. The only time you get to see an actual PhD *doctor* is if you are obviously seriously wounded, or in a flight unit and happen to get lucky because the flight doc felt like pulling sick call duty.

No one.....NO ONE leaves the service without some sort of lifelong injury, however small. If you are unlucky enough to be medically retired as I was, and they can't figure out (read: don't want to put forth the effort to send you to a specialist) exactly what's wrong with you ( because the physicians assistant who is your primary care manager refuses to believe you are 100% not faking an injury...even after seeing the MRI results) they make something up that has nothing to do with your actual symptoms or proven injuries. ( In my case it is degenerative disc disease; C5-C6, L4-L5, and L5-S1...among other various injuries....What was my official diagnosis, to get me out of their hair? Fibromyalgia.) (Oh and I was also told by my units PA that I was 10 years too young for surgery, and that degenerative disc disease is completely normal for an in shape, barely 30 something; that it happens to everyone as they age.)

Then while still on active duty you get to do the VA exam...all soothing smiles...and when they don't use the proper devices or procedures and outright LIE about things like range of motion ( which you aren't supposed to know directly affects your disability % ...for that matter you aren't supposed to know there even *are*, BY LAW, proper devices and procedures...) you are told "you can only get one exam, our hands are tied."

Folks like me decide to just stay away from the VA. (Nearest military treatment facility is over 2 hours away, anyway)
I set up my own physical therapy routine at home, and yes on occasion I "self medicate" when the pain is too great to even sit up out of bed.

TLDR: Folks enter the service not getting any real help most of the time for however long they serve - and so generally don't know when they're being screwed and lied to when they leave the service....that or they have been so conditioned to it that they expect to be screwed and lied to.