EEllis wrote:I have more than a little doubt as to the veracity of this story but even in the information given we are not talking about a little bookkeeping help. They are referring to vets that have someone other than themselves legally responsible for their government benefits. This is not using some VA bookkeeping assistance but someone else having control over their finances. This wouldn't be something one did because they were bad with budgets. You would have to have much bigger issues.
This is obviously an assumption on your part and not based on the facts. Not only that, but you have misrepresented the facts (in the part that I highlighted.)
When a Veteran Will Be Appointed a Fiduciary for Benefits Purposes
A veteran can be deemed incompetent due to mental disability, advanced age, or even physical infirmity. A finding of incompetence must be supported by medical evidence or a court ruling. In some cases, a court may have ruled you incompetent, and then the VA will also find you incompetent to manage your benefits.
Other times the VA will rely on the findings made by the VA doctor who conducted the Compensation and Pension Exam when deciding that a veteran is incompetent. The Compensation and Pension exam is the exam that is ordered to evaluate your disability after you have applied for disability compensation. The report from this exam will contain a medical opinion about whether or not your disability is service-connected, but may also include information about your mental capacity to handle money.
The VA also relies on medical findings from your routine medical visits to the VA (or a private physician) when deciding if you can handle your own VA benefits or not.
Being found incompetent by the VA to manage your VA benefits will not affect your right to handle other finances or assets you may have.
Note that the VA can determine that you are not physically able to handle your benefit checks. Clearly that eliminates any concerns about mental instability. Additionally, a court determination of incompetence is not even required. Not only that, but the VA's own doctors can determine you're incompetent, a clear conflict of interest.
Furthermore, this is not even a determination that you can't handle your own finances. It only reaches to whether or not the VA thinks you can handle your benefits checks.
If this is not a violation of a veterans' rights, what is? As Senator Grassley points out, it doesn't even fit within the legal definition of what justifies a NICS ban.