It\u2019s been six months since a\u00a0now-infamous email<\/a>\u00a0presented<\/a>\u00a0millions of federal workers with a pivotal decision: They could reply \u201cresign\u201d to give up their job and receive full pay and benefits through the end of September. Or they could stay in their positions and hope they didn\u2019t get laid off in the ensuing chaotic months of the second Trump administration.<\/p>\n Perhaps no agency was impacted more than the Department of Veterans Affairs, which runs by far the largest federal payroll outside of the military, with more than 467,000 employees providing health care and benefits to 9.1 million veterans.<\/p>\n VA leaders said there was plenty of room for cuts without compromising care, but they insisted front-line health care providers such as doctors and nurses were too valuable to let go.<\/p>\n Until now, VA has not disclosed exactly which employees took the offer. But records obtained by The War Horse through Freedom of Information Act requests show that while human resources, information technology, and other administrative jobs make up the bulk of the more than 10,000 deferred resignations, hundreds of employees who typically interact with patients, including nurses, claims assistants, therapists, pharmacists, and psychologists, were also on the list. Click here for a full list of positions.<\/a><\/p>\n Even without deferred resignations, front-line medical staff are leaving the Veterans Health Administration. Since the end of last September, VA has 2,000 fewer registered nurses and 750 fewer doctors, according to the\u00a0latest VA workforce dashboard<\/a>. By comparison, during the same period the previous year,\u00a0VA had added a net total<\/a>\u00a0of 3,000 RNs and 200 doctors.<\/p>\n The voluntary exodus comes as VA strives to cut a total of 30,000 workers through deferred resignations, early retirements, attrition, and other means by Sept. 30 after backing off what a\u00a0leaked memo<\/a>\u00a0in March said were plans to eliminate 80,000 positions. The department has come under fire from veterans\u2019 advocates and Democratic lawmakers, who say VA is already critically understaffed.<\/p>\n \u201cMake no mistake\u2014this draining of talent from VA is already having a damaging and dangerous impact on the quality and timeliness of care,\u201d Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat from Connecticut, said in a statement to The War Horse. \u201cThis information on the deferred resignation program (DRP)\u2014which had to be FOIA\u2019ed\u2014exposes the staggering number of critical health positions and essential support staff that are fleeing the department across the country.\u201d<\/p>\n Peter Kasperowicz, press secretary at VA, insisted this isn\u2019t the case. He said VA was extending appointment times and opening new health clinics, which is starting to reduce wait times for care.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAs Secretary [Doug] Collins has said,\u00a0the days of kicking the can down the road and measuring VA\u2019s progress by how much money it spends and how many people it employs\u2014rather than how many veterans it helps\u2014are over.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Who Took the Deferred Resignation?<\/p>\n Overall, VA cut 10,302 employees through the deferred resignation program between Jan. 28 and May 16\u2014the deadline to apply.<\/p>\n According to the data, 1,355 human resources managers and assistants, 1,010 program analysts, and 928 IT staff took the option, the highest three categories of employees to depart through the separations.<\/p>\n Collins has said positions deemed \u201cmission-critical,\u201d including doctors, nurses, police officers, and others who interact directly with veterans, were exempt from taking the DRP option, though 214 nurses, 35 doctors, and 24 police were on the list provided to The War Horse.<\/p>\n Hundreds more were denied requests for the buyouts. A screenshot of\u00a0VA\u2019s Deferred Resignation Request Tracker,<\/a>\u00a0shared with The War Horse and first reported in May by NPR, showed about 1,300 nurses and 800 medical support assistants had applied.<\/p>\n \u201cVA has multiple safeguards in place to ensure these staff reductions do not impact veteran care or benefits,\u201d Kasperowicz told The War Horse.<\/p>\n Kasperowicz said that while any employee could request a deferred resignation, approvals were based on VA mission need. A small number of doctors, nurses, and other clinical staff will be permitted to resign, he said, \u201cbut only if they are no longer providing clinical care to veterans in their current roles.\u201d<\/p>\n Even though support staff make up the majority of workers leaving under the deferred resignation option, veterans care will be impacted, said Suzanne Gordon, senior policy analyst at the Veterans Healthcare Policy Institute, a non-partisan think tank that advocates against VA privatization. \u201cVA needs more people, not less,\u201d Gordon said. \u201cI think that it\u2019s naive at best and duplicitous at worst to say that because these people aren\u2019t nurses or doctors, that these cuts won\u2019t hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n VA said it had cut about 17,000 positions as of the start of July, and was\u00a0on track to cut another 12,000<\/a>through September. It hasn\u2019t formally announced where the 10,000 deferred resignations fit in.\u00a0<\/p>\n The agency has said that employees in positions that most directly work with veterans are exempt from the federal hiring freeze that has gripped the agency since January. But it may be hard to continue hiring doctors and medical staff with so many support staff leaving, Blumenthal said.<\/p>\n \u201cIn rural areas, it will be incredibly difficult\u2014if not impossible\u2014to backfill those positions in a timely manner, especially when a significant portion of staff leaving are HR professionals tasked with recruiting and hiring those positions,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n When support staff leave, more tasks fall to nurses and other \u201cmission-critical\u201d positions, said Irma Westmoreland, a staff nurse at Charlie Norwood VA in Augusta, Georgia, and secretary-treasurer of National Nurses United.<\/p>\n \u201cThose tasks do not go away when there is no one there to do them,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are cleaning rooms, delivering meal trays, and running labs when we should be providing nursing care to our veterans.\u201d<\/p>\n Cuts Follow Years of Hiring<\/p>\n Since 2017, Trump\u2019s first year in the White House, VA had been dramatically expanding its workforce by nearly 90,000 employees. One reason cited for the staffing increase is the 2022 PACT Act, one of the largest expansions of benefits in VA history, which has led to the new enrollment of nearly\u00a0half a million<\/a>veterans in VA benefits over the past three years. But the overall number of veterans using VA benefits has stayed relatively flat for the past two decades, hovering between 9 and 10 million.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Department\u2019s history shows that adding more employees to the system does not automatically mean better results,\u201d\u00a0Collins said<\/a>\u00a0in a June Senate committee hearing. \u201cOur goal is to ensure we have employees where they are needed, cut unnecessary overhead, and strategically reduce staff to ensure VA\u2019s budget is mostly going directly to veterans.\u201d<\/p>\n Speeding up the processing of new disability claims has been one of the agency\u2019s top priorities, and officials say the 10 highest claims processing days in VA history all occurred in February.<\/p>\n Reducing 30,000 workers since January will put VA at just below 2023 staffing levels but well above 2019. Still, a\u00a0VA Inspector General report<\/a>\u00a0found in 2023 that all 139 VHA medical facilities surveyed reported at least one severe occupational staffing shortage.<\/p>\n \u201cNo health care organization\u2014especially one serving over nine million veterans\u2014can afford to lose over 30,000 employees without consequences,\u201d House Veterans\u2019 Affairs Committee ranking member Mark Takano, a Democrat from California, said in a statement to The War Horse. \u201cThis is not attrition\u2014it\u2019s erosion.\u201d<\/p>\n Republicans, however, are not alarmed. House Veterans\u2019 Affairs Committee Chairman Mike Bost, a Republican from Illinois, said in\u00a0a statement<\/a>\u00a0that he had full confidence in Secretary Collins\u2019 plan to make the right decision when it came to VA\u2019s workforce.<\/p>\n \u201cThe vast majority of VA employees come to work and proudly serve our veterans,\u201d Bost said. \u201cHowever, poor-performing VA employees must be held accountable when they aren\u2019t putting veterans first and we will ensure this message is clear, not just through words\u2014but also through action.\u201d<\/p>\n Are you a current or former VA employee who would like to share your story? Reach out to our reporter at\u00a0leah.rosenbaum@thewarhorse.org<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0leah.rosenbaum@proton.me<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n This War Horse story was edited by Mike Frankel, fact-checked by Jess Rohan, and copy-edited by Mitchell Hansen-Dewar. Hrisanthi Pickett wrote the headlines.<\/p>\n Republish This Story<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Screenshot-2025-08-24-at-8.35.23-PM.png\")
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