The Plot to Privatize Veteran Brain Care

In early January, Reps. Jack Bergman (R-MI) and Sarah Elfreth (D-MD) introduced the BEACON Act, a bill that pledges to enhance care for a signature wound of the global war on terror: traumatic brain injuries, or TBI.

The legislation, currently moving through the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee pipeline, would award $60 million in grants over three years to private entities for TBI treatment and research, explicitly circumventing well-established clinical channels within the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), which are widely considered the best in the world.

Senior Analyst Russell Lemle and Reporting Fellow Jasper Craven unravel the plot to defund the BEACON ACT, a bipartisan pledge to treat traumatic brain injuries in veterans for The American Prospect.