Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise today to express my concern and disgust at recent revelations of improper and dishonest conduct by senior executives at the Department of Veterans Affairs, including the director of the St. Paul office of the Veterans Benefits Administration.

   According to a report released by the VA's Office of the Inspector General this week, two Veterans Benefits Administration executives used their positions to assign themselves to different jobs that involved fewer responsibilities while maintaining their high salaries. One of them has been the director of the VBA St. Paul regional office since October of 2014. The inspector general found that the St. Paul VBA director used her influence as director of the VBA Eastern Area Office to compel the relocation of the previous St. Paul office director. She then proceeded to submit her own name for consideration to fill the vacancy she herself had created.

   Taking on the job of directing the St. Paul regional office was actually a step down in responsibility for this administrator. In the inspector general's words, she ``went from being responsible for oversight of 16 [regional offices] to being responsible for only 1 [regional office].'' But she kept her previous senior executive service salary of $173,949 per year. She also received over $129,000 in relocation expenses.

   So look at this: She had a responsible job managing 16 regional offices. She created an opening by transferring the person under her. She took that opening and went from supervising 16 regional offices to supervising 1. Then she kept the same salary, going from 16 offices to 1 office, and then took $129,000 in relocation expenses.

   This is the kind of action that has created the breach of trust between our veterans and the departments that exist to serve their needs. There are so many people who have such good will who work at the Veterans' Administration, including in Minnesota, and there are so many deserving veterans who deserve their help. But to make this truly work, we have to show that the people at the top are accountable.

   What this director did was not responsible, it was not a good use of taxpayer money, and it certainly was not fair to our veterans. This is a senior executive who is supposed to be focused on ensuring that veterans are being served the way they deserve and who instead used her position to push out one of her colleagues and get herself a plum assignment where she would have fewer responsibilities but at the same time keep the same salary. This conduct is unacceptable. It erodes the public's trust in the VA. It is commendable that the VA inspector general took action by referring these two cases to the U.S. attorney for possible criminal prosecution. The VA needs to do right by our veterans and our taxpayers by holding bad actors accountable and implementing reforms to prevent exploitation such as this from ever happening again.

   I yield the floor.