For the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, the 2025 fiscal year ended on September 30, 2025. A review of the VA’s efforts last year offers a glimpse of the administration’s priorities, and what veterans can expect in the next fiscal year.
During FY 2025, the VA:
- Decreased the backlog of veterans waiting for VA benefits more than 40%.
- Permanently housed 51,936 homeless veterans.
- Processed more disability compensation and pension claims in a single year than ever before, with an all-time fiscal-year high of three million processed claims before September 30th (in comparison, the VA processed a total of 2,517,519 in fiscal year 2024).
- Opened 20 new health care clinics across the country.
- Offered over 1.4 million appointments on weekends, in the evening, and in the early morning, to provide veterans with care outside of normal operating hours.
- Allocated an extra $800 million for infrastructure improvements to VA health care facilities as part of the Veterans Health Administration’s Non-Recurring Maintenance program.
- Extended the length of new VA community care authorizations to one year for 30 standardized types of care, meaning Veterans referred by VA to community care for eligible standardized types of care will receive 12 full months of uninterrupted treatment at VA’s expense before having to obtain a VA reauthorization.
- Removed the need for a second VA doctor to authorize enabled VA-enrolled Veterans to access health care from non-VA providers at the VA’s expense when it is in their best medical interest.
- Implemented reforms to make it easier for survivors to obtain VA benefits.
- Continued developing the Federal Electronic Health Record system and announced the complete list of additional medical facilities at which it will deploy in 2026.
- Partnered with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to recover $106 million in duplicate billing.
- Terminated union contracts for most bargaining unit employees.
- Fired more than 1,400 “non-mission critical” probationary employees who served less than two years.
- Ended DEI initiatives and treatment for gender dysphoria.
- Recouped millions from terminated union contracts and canceled DEI programs.
Clearly, this administration is interested in processing claims quickly, creating new outreach programs, and eliminating positions and contracts that do not serve the current mission.
VA Secretary Doug Collins has said “Keeping the promises America has made to its Veterans is the sole purpose of the Department of Veterans Affairs. I am proud of the work we’ve done under President Trump to transform VA from a bureaucratic organization to a service organization, cutting red tape and placing Veterans at the center of everything we do along the way. And we’re just getting started.”
Thus, now more than ever, it is important to pursue your claims for VA disability benefits.
Contact us to appeal now!
Have you been denied benefits for your service-connected disability? We are here to help you appeal! Contact us to reach our advocates today, or call 1 (877) 777-4021 to take the first step in obtaining the VA disability benefits you deserve.
