ROCHESTER, Minn. – On Wednesday U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar (D) Minnesota, spent some time in Rochester honoring area veterans at a pinning ceremony in recognition of Veterans Day.

After the ceremony, she spoke exclusively to KIMT News 3 about a letter that was sent to the U.S. Army Inspector General calling for the investigation into thousands of wrongful discharges.

She tells us since 2009 more than 22,000 soldiers have been dismissed for misconduct after returning from deployment. It was discovered that many of those veterans had been diagnosed with mental illness like PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and Traumatic Brain Injury.

Klobuchar at 11 other U.S. Senators want a full investigation in to the discharge of these service-members to see if they were warranted.

“We asked the Inspector General to look at what happened here and to figure out if maybe they shouldn’t have been discharged for misconduct, maybe they’re actually having mental health problems that were possibly related to their service,” she explains.

Because of being dismissed for misconduct, many of those 22,000 veterans are unable to get the health services needed to treat their mental illness, that they very likely could have developed because of deployment.