Good afternoon.

The House and Senate are both in session this week. The Senate will continue its consideration of key Cabinet nominees, and the House will hopefully jump-start the reconciliation process with the passage of crucial legislation. The House Veterans Affairs Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee is set to review the Biden administration’s VA on Thursday, which we are sure will get very interesting, very quickly.

On Thursday night, the HillVets Foundation will host a happy hour at Valor Brewpub from 5:30-7:30 pm. The Nimitz team will be out in full force to support, and we look forward to seeing many of you there.

In this week’s Nimitz Report:

• Reconciling before reconciliation: Speaker Johnson tries to tackle hard-line conservatives

• 60 Minutes on psychedelics: Veterans attend retreat to address PTSD and other trauma

• More alarms for the admin: Veterans groups point to broken promises to Afghan allies & the sudden firing of women and minority advisors at the VA

WHO’S HAVING EVENTS THIS WEEK?

Thursday, February 6th

• ❌ Subcommittee Hearing: “VA First, Veteran Second: The Biden-Harris Legacy,” House Veterans Affairs Committee (HVAC) Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee at 2 pm. Watch here.

• 🍷 HillVets Happy Hour: Valor Brewpub at 5:30 pm. RSVP here.

NEWS DRIVING THE WEEK

Subcommittees in the Senate are expected to hold votes for two key Trump Cabinet nominees on Tuesday. Director of National Intelligence nominee Tulsi Gabbard and Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) nominee Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., two of the more controversial Trump picks, will have to secure majority votes before moving forward to the full chamber. Neither nominee can afford to lose a single Republican vote if the Democrats unanimously oppose.

House Speaker Mike Johnson plans to hold a critical vote for the Republican Party’s agenda this week, beginning the budget reconciliation process and working around Democratic opposition. Hard-line conservatives, however, are raising alarms about the level of spending cuts in the proposed legislation. A member of the Budget Committee commented, “[The vote] will not happen this week — or it will fail.” The member went on to say, “Reconciliation is hitting [a] big wall with the ‘big beautiful bill’ because it is not getting [the] job done on cuts necessary to ensure deficits go down.”

Veteran News

Over the weekend, 60 Minutes aired a story on veterans, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and psychedelics. A group of nine veterans traveled to a remote village in Mexico last year for a week-long psychedelic retreat, seeking to address many of their hidden wounds. One of the individuals on the trip, Randy Weaver, claimed he had previously tried every PTSD treatment offered by the VA including talk therapy, exposure therapy, meditation, and anti-depressants. “You get to a point where you're-- you're so mentally exhausted and you've created so much destruction that you-- your demons tell yourself that these-- your family would be better off without you,” he told Anderson Cooper. Eight of the nine who attended the retreat reported improved symptomology after one year, calling their experience “life-changing.”

Several veterans groups are asking President Trump to reconsider his policy regarding Afghan allies who are now barred from entering the United States. Following an executive order suspending the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program last week, at least 200 service members’ families are among the thousands stranded in Afghanistan. Another executive order preventing the distribution of foreign aid has also disrupted services for Afghans seeking legal entry into the country through special immigrant visas. Veterans groups and other organizations seeking to help this population are pointing to Trump’s campaign criticism of the withdrawal, with one of them stating, “I just don’t believe that he would do that and then not try to help our allies. I’m just hoping this is a mistake.”

Last Wednesday, the VA dismissed the directors of the Center for Women Veterans and the Center for Minority Veterans without explanation. Lourdes Tiglao and James Albino, an Air Force and Navy veteran respectively, had both served as the VA’s primary advisors on these issues since 2021. Officials from the department have said that the dismissals were not related to the Trump administration’s efforts to end diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs.

National News

President Donald Trump has agreed to “immediately pause” tariffs imposed on Mexico for one month. As part of the agreement, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum pledged to reinforce the country’s northern border with 10,000 National Guard members to stem the flow of illegal drugs to the U.S. Another component of the deal includes a U.S. commitment to help prevent the trafficking of high-powered weapons to Mexico. American stock prices dropped dramatically this morning due to fears of a deepening trade war.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

FOR FUN

The Super Bowl is this weekend! Whether you care about the outcome of the game, or you’re just in it for the halftime show like Danielle, we hope everyone has a fun time Sunday night.

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