By Nick De Gregorio
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Dear Senator Warren,
Happy Veterans Day. Please stop treating us like your props.
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Earlier this month, you promised America Medicare for All. With its $21 Trillion price tag, you admitted that we would need to cut $800 billion out of the defense budget to pay for it. The next day, you promised unprecedented increases in pay for our men and women in uniform. That math does not add up, and you know it.
What will you do to fund the $93 Trillion Green New Deal that you support? How much of the defense budget will you slash to support that endeavor? As China increases its defense spending year over year and continues to threaten our interests abroad, how much money are you willing to divert away from our national defense to fulfill your ill-advised, unrealistic campaign promises?
And why are you sitting on your plan to alleviate veteran suicide? Last week, you tweeted that you had a way to cut veteran suicide in half in your first term.
Do the 22 veterans who take their own lives every day not matter to you until you are elected president?
Would it not make sense, as a duly elected United States Senator, to work across the aisle with your Republican colleagues right now on this pressing issue?
Or is the politicization of this epidemic worth more to you than spearheading a timely solution for this national tragedy?
Veterans are used to being lied to on the campaign trail, so this is nothing new. But your ideas go beyond simple fiction. You ask us to suspend our disbelief when you claim we will somehow be safer and better cared for under these policy proposals. After years of being subjected to inadequate state-run medical care and persistent political stress on our military budget, it’s hard to follow your logic. And it’s hard to see how you have our best interests at heart.
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Nick De Gregorio is a Bergen County native and a Senior Advisor to the Pallotta for Congress campaign. Nick grew up in Ridgewood before committing himself to military service. As a Marine Corps infantry officer of nine years, he served four tours of duty to include operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Upon his honorable discharge from the Marines, Nick used the Post-9/11 GI Bill to attend Georgetown University, where he graduated with dual masters degrees in business administration and foreign policy. Nick currently works in finance and lives in Fair Lawn with his wife Emily and daughter Siena.
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