ICYMI: Common Defense Executive Director SLAMS plans to cut va staffers AT NYC RALLY
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: April 10, 2025
PRESS CONTACT: press@commondefense.us
“Every veteran who walks into this building has already paid for that care with their service. We made a promise. And now MAGA billionaires want to break it.”
NEW YORK, NY — Yesterday, at a rally organized by the National Nurses Organizing Committee (NNOC) and National Nurses United (NNU), Common Defense Executive Director and U.S. Army veteran Jose Vasquez delivered a powerful, deeply personal speech outside the James J. Peters VA Medical Center in the Bronx, speaking out against a potential reduction in force (RIF) at the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Just four weeks out from surgery for pancreatic cancer—diagnosed and operated on at the same Bronx VA hospital—Vasquez called out the cruelty of a plan that would cut 83,000 VA workers nationwide.
“I’m 50 years old. I served 15 years in the U.S. Army. I have cancer. And I’m getting treatment here at this VA,” said Vasquez, who received his diagnosis last month and underwent surgery at the same Bronx VA facility. “Now I’m supposed to believe that a billionaire gets to decide whether this hospital stays open? That’s bulls--t.”
Vasquez, who was stationed at the now-contaminated Schofield Barracks in Hawaii in the 1990s, linked his exposure to toxic chemicals to his recent diagnosis, underscoring the urgent need for expanded care—not layoffs. He praised the diverse medical staff who treated him, including nurses and doctors from the Dominican Republic, the Philippines, Colombia, and New York itself—many of whom are veterans and union members.
His speech spotlighted the moral cost of war, the strain already burdening VA staff, and the injustice of treating veteran health care like a business. “Every veteran who walks into this building has already paid for that care with their service,” he said. “We made a promise. And now MAGA billionaires want to break it.”
Vasquez’s remarks come as leaked Project 2025 documents reveal a sweeping plan to privatize and slash federal services, with the VA at the center of their austerity agenda. His voice joins a growing chorus of veterans mobilizing in defense of the VA system—already underfunded and overstretched—and standing up against Trump’s MAGA movement and their hand-picked loyalists.
“We’re not going to let two billionaires decide the future of our VA,” he concluded. “We’ve got a lot of work to do—but I promise you this: Common Defense and our allies are going to fight like hell.”
For more on Common Defense’s work to protect the VA and oppose authoritarian attacks on democracy, visit commondefense.us.
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Common Defense Civic Engagement is a grassroots, veteran-led organization (501c4) that was founded in 2016. We empower veterans to stand up for our communities against the rising tide of racism, hate, and violence, to organize against the entrenched powers that have rigged our economy, and to champion an equitable and representative democracy, where “liberty and justice” truly is for all. For too long, politicians from both political parties have attempted to use veterans as unwilling political props, and Common Defense serves as a home for veterans to organize and speak for themselves and support the candidates who truly share our values.