Schiff calls national guard repayments ‘outrageous’
Dignity Health-Glendale Memorial Hospital hosted Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank) Tuesday for an update on the current political climate in Washington, D.C., heading into the tail end of the presidential election.
Co-hosted by the Women’s Civic League of Glendale, the luncheon gave Schiff an opportunity during House recess to address his district on issues including Russian interference in the general election, political progress in Iraq and a stagnant congress.
Schiff also took the opportunity to once again condemn the current efforts by the Pentagon to collect repayments from California National Guard service members who were given unauthorized reenlistment bonuses, calling on Washington to halt collection and reimburse soldiers.
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“It’s outrageous that the guard or the Pentagon would go after these soldiers who deployed, saw combat — many of whom were injured — to get them to pay back incentives they had every reason to expect were completely legit,” Schiff said.
“We ought to forgive the debt. We are going to take up a defense bill when we get back from the election. [The debt forgiveness] should be a small part of that bill,” Schiff said. “In the scale of the defense bill, this is a small amount of money and it’s so patently unfair and unethical to go after them for it. I find it shocking that this is even the case.”
The debt collection against soldiers began after audits in California revealed unauthorized payments doled out around a decade ago as reenlistment incentives during wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The repayments often totaled more than $15,000 and were given to nearly 10,000 soldiers, many of them combat veterans.
Schiff also forecast some of Washington’s most pressing issues after the general election, such as the ongoing fight over filling a vacant Supreme Court seat, the struggle over the Affordable Care Act and whether the economy is recovering quickly enough.
Two functional parties are needed for the government to work and it’s still unclear how a loss in November would affect Republicans, argued Schiff.
“A Trump loss, I don’t know how the GOP would interpret. Conservatives will say ‘we lost because for the third time we nominated someone who wasn’t a true conservative ...We need to be more conservative,’” Schiff said. “Mainstream will say they lost because their nominee wasn’t mainstream enough. I don’t know where that leaves the party.”
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Jeff Landa, jeff.landa@latimes.com
Twitter: @JeffLanda
