Sen. Jay Rockefeller, who announced he will retire after his current term ends in January, is set to receive a lifetime achievement award from the West Virginia AFL-CIO.
The labor group will present the award Friday at its convention at Charleston’s Four Points by Sheraton hotel. Rockefeller, D-W.Va., also is expected to speak.
Rockefeller has a long history of working to bring jobs to West Virginia and expand business, both as governor and senator.
“He’s worked to protect retirees from reduced benefits or pensions,” according to information on his Senate website. “He’s aggressively pursued legislation to assist Americans whose jobs were shipped overseas — also known as Trade Adjustment Assistance, or TAA. Senator Rockefeller fought to expand TAA to include a better tax credit to help the unemployed obtain health insurance, in addition to the income support, job training and relocation assistance already offered.”
Rockefeller also has been considered a champion of veterans, having served on the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee as both a member and its chairman.
In light of the recent scandal involving the Department of Veterans Affairs, Rockefeller was appointed to a conference committee tasked with hammering out details on legislation aimed at reforming VA medical facilities. The committee met for the first time Tuesday evening, and Rockefeller noted in his remarks that although veterans come home, they still live with unanticipated health care costs and “unintended consequences.”
“Let me be absolutely clear in what I’m saying: We need to improve the VA, not tear it down,” said Rockefeller, who refused to call for the resignation of former VA Secretary Eric Shinseki and has repeatedly called on Congress to increase funding to the department. “Without the VA, veterans would struggle to find the same level of care for mental health issues and the many other illnesses unique to our veterans population.”
Rockefeller went on to note only the VA is capable of providing appropriate care for veterans, and the department has come a long way since the 1980s and 1990s when the system relied on inpatient, hospital-based care. Though he is “deeply troubled” by the recent accusations of long waiting lists and veterans dying without receiving care, he says the idea that the VA is mismanaged is simply wrong.
“Addressing the root cause of this problem means finding the political will to properly fund this agency, and that is something Congress has been sorely lacking,” he said. “I realize some of you will say that the VA has enough funding, that if it was managed better, then its problems will go away. That is wrong.”
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Rep. David McKinley, R-W.Va., is just one of 65 members of Congress who want to see kidnapped Israeli teenagers returned home safely.
McKinley wrote a letter, with the support of 65 members of Congress, to Secretary of State John Kerry and the State Department, urging them to find the three teenagers and ensure their safe return home. The teens were kidnapped more than 10 days ago in the West Bank, and Israeli authorities believe the kidnapping was the work of Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
“These kidnapped teenagers are not enemy combatants and should not be held as prisoners of war,” McKinley said. “They are simply students who found themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
One of the teens holds dual Israeli and American citizenship, making the crime “a matter concerning an American citizen in danger,” McKinley said.
“We’re asking Secretary of State John Kerry to use his full authority to demand the release of these teenagers and to pressure the Palestinian Authority to take further action,” McKinley said.
Compiled by Whitney Burdette