In dueling speeches, Trump and Clinton promise reform and | MilitaryTimes

TITLE: Trump and Clinton promise VA reform and attack each other's plans

Just a day before a joint event on military and veterans issues, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in separate speeches both vowed to build up the military and warned their opponent doesn’t understand the needs of troops.

The dueling remarks from the Republican and Democratic presidential nominees also included promises from both to defeat Islamic State militants and reform the Department of Veterans Affairs, pledges each has repeated in recent weeks on the campaign trail.

But the details of their plans differ significantly, and both candidates accused the other of offering a more risky and unstable path for the country.

Trump’s remarks, delivered at a town hall-style event in Virginia, included a promise from the business mogul that any veterans who seek health care outside the VA system will have their costs fully covered.

“You’re going to get taken care of 100 percent,” he said to enthusiastic applause. “Government is going to pay the bill. Should have been done a long time ago.”

Republicans have called that an expansion of the existing VA Choice Card program, which allows some veterans facing long wait times to have private-care clinics cover their medical needs.
Democrats have called it the first step to privatizing VA services, and Clinton has vowed to keep funding in the federal bureaucracy to improve services.

She used her Florida speech to ridicule Trump’s veterans plans, calling them as misguided as his recent gaffes sparring with a Gold Star father and accepting a Purple Heart from from a supporter.

“A man who is so wrong about our veterans is not fit to be commander in chief,” she said, repeating her campaign trail assertion that Trump is “temperamentally unfit and totally unqualified” to lead the country.

She also promised to keep strong ties with American allies overseas, and “give our military everything they need” to succeed in fighting terrorists worldwide, adding that “I will also support them with care and benefits they deserve when they come home, including job training and mental health care.”
Trump has labeled that as a false promise, accusing President Barack Obama -- and by extension his former secretary of state -- of shortchanging the military and creating a weak, under-resourced fighting force.

“We don’t take care of vets, and we don’t take care of our troops in the field,” he said. “Their equipment is old. … This is not the (military) we want. We‘re going to rebuild it with the finest technology in the world.”

On Wednesday, both candidates are scheduled to travel to New York for a joint NBC/Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America event to discuss in greater detail their plans for veterans programs and military support. They are not scheduled to be on stage simultaneously, but instead will field questions in separate 30-minute sessions.

That event is scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. Eastern time.