god bless you all and may god protect our troops. >> good morning, i am jackie walorski. i support the community act as a member of the veterans affairs committee and a presumptive voter. we need a common sense bill. without this real-world accountability, the v.a. has become the epitome of the bureaucracy. i hear every day from veterans who are forced to wait months on end for their disability claim process. unfortunately this isn't typical. typical.s average wait times are 330 days around the country. the backlog has been associated with thousands of patients waiting for their paperwork to clear. on top of that they are grieving loved ones and have to wait on the compensation they're owed. it these men and women who fought for our country. they should not have to fight for their own benefits. we trace much of this problem back to the sheer lack of accountability. at least three preventable deaths have occurred. two officials were to retire early and three were recommended while the rest face unspecified actions. that is bad enough. in many cases we have found not only h

congresswoman jackie walorski from indiana gave the republican address spirit she called on the president to support the veterans accountability legislation. >> ladies and gentlemen, i'm joe biden. i'm filling in for president obama, who is abroad. i want to talk to you today about the minimum wage and the overwhelming need to raise the minimum wage. there's no reason in the world why an american working 40 hours a week has to live in poverty. but right now a worker earning the federal minimum wage makes about $14,500 a year. and you all know that's incredibly hard for an individual to live on, let alone

congresswoman jackie walorski gave the republican address. she called on congress to support veteran accountability legislation. >> ladies and gentlemen, i'm joe biden. i'm filling in for president obama, who is abroad. i want to talk to you today about the minimum wage and the overwhelming need to raise the minimum wage. there's no reason in the world why an american working 40 hours a week has to live in poverty. but right now a worker earning the federal minimum wage makes about $14,500 a year. and you all know that's incredibly hard for an individual to live on, let alone raise a family on. but if we raise the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, that same worker will be making $20,200 a year -- and with existing tax credits would earn enough to bring that family or a family of four out of poverty. but there's a lot of good reasons why raising the minimum wage makes sense. not only would it put more hard-earned money into the pockets of 28 million americans, moving millions of them out of poverty, it's also good for business. and let me tell y

i'm congresswoman jackie walorski. i am calling on president obama to support hr-4031. it is aca management accountability act. i am a member of the veterans affairs committee. i represent many veterans. i am the daughter of an air force veteran. we need this bill because it will empower the secretary of veterans affairs to fire senior officials who are not up to the job. without this real world accountability, the ba has become the academy of bureaucracy. i hear from veterans who are forced to wear months -- week months for their disability claims to be processed this is typical. average wait times or 330 days. even worse, the backlog has been associated with the deaths of thousands of patients. are --of that, they their loved ones have to deal with miles of red tape. these men and women fought for our country. they should not have to fight for their own benefits. we have traced much of this problem back to a sheer lack of accountability. hospitalof an atlanta where deaths have occurred announced that two top officials wanted to retire early and three were reprimanded.