The veteran community cannot wait: Pass the take care of America’s Veterans Act now

For more than three decades in the Air Force, my mission was taking care of our people. As the service’s senior officer for manpower and personnel, I answered for the well-being of airmen and their families. Shortly after retiring in 2022, I began my next mission: Leading the Military Officers Association of America. More than 350,000 members strong, MOAA works to protect the earned benefits of all who serve and have served, along with their families and their survivors, across all ranks and uniformed services.

As part of this work, I am urging Congress to pass the Take Care of America’s Veterans Act to keep this nation’s promises to our veterans, to the caregivers who sustain them, and to the survivors who carry their legacy.

The bill includes one of MOAA’s top priorities: The Major Richard Star Act , which would end an unjust offset forcing more than 59,000 combat-injured veterans to forfeit earned retirement pay. Many of our members, and those they led, have waited years for this fix.

But there is much more to the Take Care of America’s Veterans Act. The bill gathers more than 60 pieces of legislation — almost all bipartisan, and many have been stalled in Congress for years. Together, they would help family caregivers rebuild their financial and professional futures after years of sacrifice in support of veterans. They would allow surviving spouses to retain critical benefits by removing arcane remarriage penalties, and increase Dependency and Indemnity Compensation for all survivors, with special attention to ensuring surviving spouses of veterans with ALS receive the benefits they deserve. And they would fund community programs working to prevent veteran suicide.

MOAA is one of more than 20 stakeholder organizations that support this legislation. A recent survey by Mission Roll Call found 71 percent of veterans feel the same .

The bill is not without its flaws, and the misconceptions surrounding it deserve a direct answer. The mechanism used to pay for these worthy, long-overdue programs is far from perfect. But the bill ensures projected savings created by changes to the VA disability system regarding sleep apnea and tinnitus — changes already in motion at the VA — will remain within the veteran community. Failing to take advantage of this unique but fleeting legislative opportunity not only costs us the chance to enact dozens of meaningful changes, but it also means any savings from these imminent rule changes will be returned to the Treasury.

No veteran will see existing benefits reduced if this bill passes. No disability ratings will drop, and no treatment plans will be altered or interrupted. Future veterans will retain access to VA care for service-connected injuries like tinnitus and sleep apnea — the rating process will change, but they will not be marginalized or abandoned.

The only true threat to earned benefits is continued inaction, where combat-injured retirees keep losing pay they have earned, caregivers cannot return to the workforce, and survivors struggle to rebuild their lives without full and fair compensation for their service member’s sacrifice. These are not hypotheticals — they are realities facing service members, families, and survivors of those serving right now in the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. I worry far more about inaction costing them the support they need and earned than I do about them seeing adjusted disability ratings down the road.

Nearly all the bill’s measures have been introduced in both chambers, under Republican and Democratic majorities alike, only to stall again and again across congresses and administrations. Keeping promises to those who served is not partisan. Backing this bill, imperfections and all, is not a political act; it is a pragmatic one. It honors the current service members and veterans who gave so much, the caregivers and families who carry the weight beside them, and the survivors who keep their memory alive.

Failure to take advantage of this unique opportunity sends them back to square one with nothing to show but another year of frustration and no clear path to passing and funding these key pieces of legislation. If you set politics, emotion, and organizational interests aside and truly take a veteran-centric approach, the answer becomes clearer, and things get better for tens of millions of veterans, caregivers and survivors.

I urge Congress to pass the Take Care of America’s Veterans Act now. Those who wear and those who wore the uniform kept every promise they made to this country. The most patriotic thing we can do is keep ours.

Lt. Gen. Brian T. Kelly, USAF (Ret), is president and CEO of the Military Officers Association of America (MOAA), the nation’s largest association of military officers, and served 33 years in the Air Force, including as deputy chief of staff for manpower, personnel, and services.