Senator Murray grew up in a
household that stressed the importance of national service. Her father was a World War II veteran, and in
college she interned at the
As a senior member of the
Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee and the Military Construction and Veterans
Affairs
The American military is in a period of immense transition. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have stretched the military’s capacity and have led to the influx of hundreds of thousands of recent war veterans into a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) that did not plan for the aftermath of these military conflicts. As a result, Senator Murray is very concerned that the VA is not prepared to care for our servicemembers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, along with our aging veteran population.
The Bush Administration continually underfunded the VA and pushed to increase fees and co-payments for health care and benefits for veterans. Senator Murray worked with colleagues in both parties to fight against these efforts and to provide more funding for the VA.
When the Democrats took power in January 2007, Senator Murray took on a greater roll in determining the budget. In addition to having jurisdiction over veterans’ appropriations bills, she also sits on the Senate Budget Committee. She has used these positions to increase funding for veterans health.
As part of the fiscal year
(FY) 2007 Emergency Supplemental
Senator Murray worked to
increase funding for the VA to more than $87 billion in the FY 2008 Military
Construction and Veterans Affairs