Doug Collins comes into Veterans Affairs with two things he never stops reminding people of: service and combat with bureaucracy. He’s not a quiet technocrat. He’s a former Republican congressman who built his brand on aggressive, confrontational oversight and a constant “don’t you dare forget the troops” posture. He also served in the U.S. Air Force Reserve as a chaplain, which lets him talk about vets not like a distant policymaker but like someone who’s sat with them in hospital rooms and watched promises get delayed in paperwork.
Collins’ framing is simple and blunt: VA exists for veterans, not for itself. If that means firing people, closing underperforming facilities, contracting care outside the system, or dragging middle management into a spotlight and making them answer for failures, he’s fine with that. He talks about accountability at VA in the same way tough-on-crime politicians talk about prosecution.
Ideologically, Collins sells himself as the guy who will “cut through the DC nonsense” for vets. He leans hard on a populist message that elites in Washington talk about “our heroes” on camera and then bury them in 9-month appointment wait times off camera. He treats that gap as moral betrayal, not just admin failure.
Inside the administration, Collins is the one pushing to make veteran care both faster and more personally responsive, even if that means punching holes in legacy VA structures. He’s comfortable with outsourcing and private-sector partnerships if the alternative is telling a veteran to wait. He calls delay “a quiet way of abandoning people who didn’t abandon you.”
Critics say that’s cover for dismantling the system and steering public money to private clinics with less oversight. Collins calls that “D.C. panic from people who never had to fight a claims appeal while dealing with chronic pain.”
Right-Wing Populist
Priorities / Agenda
- “Veteran first, agency second”: Collins says VA’s loyalty chain is backwards — leadership protects process, not people. His stated mission is to flip that and embarrass anyone who resists.
- Faster care access: He wants veterans to be able to get seen where they can get seen — private, public, contracted — without waiting for permission slips that feel like punishment.
- Hard accountability: Collins talks about firing underperforming administrators like it’s a moral obligation, not a political risk. He’s comfortable naming names when local clinics fail.
- Mental health and transition: He frames veteran suicide and post-service collapse as a national crisis, not a talking point. He pushes to tighten the handoff from active duty to VA so people don’t fall into paperwork gaps.
- “Keep promises we already made”: His line is: before Congress creates any new benefits, actually deliver the ones that exist. He sells that as respect, not austerity.
Controversies
- Privatization fear: Veterans’ groups on the left warn that Collins’ “go wherever you can get care today” approach slowly bleeds VA resources into outside networks and leaves rural vets stranded.
- Populist combat style: He’s not subtle. Allies call that necessary urgency. Opponents say it’s more about television than management, and it demoralizes career staff.
- Clinic closures / consolidation: Collins argues some brick-and-mortar sites are failing vets and should be restructured or shut. Local communities hear “you’re taking our only post-service lifeline.”
- Political loyalty questions: Democrats point out he’s a partisan street fighter from House Judiciary, not a neutral administrator. Collins’ answer is basically: veterans don’t care about your committee etiquette, they care about being seen by a doctor.
- Media-forward oversight: He publicly blasts failures in real time. Career VA people say that turns internal problems into headline brawls and makes retention worse.
Senate Confirmation Vote
Votes For
- Republicans: 53
- Democrats: 20
- Independents: 2
Votes Against
- Republicans: 0
- Democrats: 23
- Independents: 0