The federal government has quietly ended the Veterans Affairs Servicing Purchase (VASP) program—a critical safety net that helped veterans across the country, including right here in Kansas, avoid foreclosure and stay in their homes. This isn’t just a policy shift. It’s another betrayal. A betrayal of the very people who stepped forward when their country needed them.
The VASP program allowed the VA to step in and purchase loans that veterans had fallen behind on, giving them a chance to stay in their homes by restructuring the loan under more manageable terms. It was never a handout. It was a last-resort rescue effort for veterans on the brink. In Kansas, where the cost of living continues to rise and access to services is often stretched thin, this program was a lifeline for many.
Now, in the middle of a national housing crisis, that lifeline is gone.
But the damage doesn’t stop there. The VA is also planning to lay off up to 80,000 workers—many of them the very people who answer calls, process claims, and schedule appointments for the veterans who depend on the system. These layoffs will affect communities across the country, and Kansas will not be spared.
Even more troubling is the federal government’s simultaneous effort to strip collective bargaining rights from VA workers, undermining one of the strongest voices veterans have within the system: the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE). This union fights every day for the frontline workers who keep the VA running—and for the veterans they serve.
In Kansas, that fight has a face: Diana Hicks, a longtime AFGE leader and fierce advocate for both veterans and VA employees. Hicks has stood up time and again against policies that threaten to privatize, underfund, or dismantle the VA system from the inside out. With the rollbacks of bargaining rights, her ability—and the union’s ability—to fight for the services veterans rely on is under attack.
What kind of message are we sending here?
Kansas has always punched above its weight in terms of service and sacrifice. From Fort Riley to McConnell Air Force Base, to our Guard units, to the families who raise their hands generation after generation, military service is part of who we are. When veterans come home, they shouldn’t have to fight a second battle just to keep a roof over their heads—or to get a claims decision in a reasonable amount of time.
In previous administrations, it meant something to have veterans in leadership—men and women who had worn the uniform themselves and knew the stakes. Today, we have fewer veterans in the White House, in Congress, and in key administrative roles than ever before. We’re now seeing what happens when that lived experience is missing from decision-making: essential programs like VASP are discarded, VA workers are slashed, and the unions that protect veterans’ access to care are silenced.
Before anyone questions my patriotism or motivation, let me be crystal clear: I am a veteran. My father served. My mother served. My uncles, my grandfather, my great-grandfather—all served. My son will serve. This country is in our bones. And loving it means calling it out when it forgets its promises.
Ending the VASP program, laying off tens of thousands of workers, and attacking the union voices that defend veteran services is not reform. It’s abandonment.
And Kansas veterans—like all veterans—deserve far better than this; lets do better.
