Veterans Affairs Chief Resigns

Veterans Affairs chief Jim Nicholson, who was forced to defend his agency's performance after revelations of shoddy health care at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, announced Tuesday that he is resigning.

Nicholson, who is returning to the private sector, has been head of the VA since February 2005. Before that, he was U.S. ambassador to the Vatican and chairman of the Republican National Committee.

Nicholson most recently has overseen a vast network of 1,400 hospitals and clinics, which provide supplemental care and rehabilitation to 5.8 million veterans.

Earlier this year, the VA was embarrassed by revelations of poor health care at Walter Reed for veterans wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nicholson was named by President George W. Bush to lead an interagency task force of seven Cabinet secretaries to determine what could be done immediately to improve veterans' care.

Nicholson defended the Veterans Administration but acknowledged there is room for improvement.

"When you're seeing over 1 million patients a week, you have to be very good, and if there is any one patient who doesn't get the care that they deserve, that's unacceptable," Nicholson said in March.

"The American people can feel very good about the health care system that their VA is providing to veterans," Nicholson said then. "But if there is a case where a veteran gets lost in the system, or suffers anxiety or their family does as a result of something we're not doing, that is unacceptable."

Nicholson was Republican national chairman from 1997 through the 2000 elections.

Within months of taking office at the VA, he had to deal with a $1 billion shortfall at the agency, requiring the Bush administration to appeal to Congress for emergency spending.

Republicans blamed the shortfall on unexpected health care demands from veterans. But Democrats said it was an example of what they said was the administration's inadequate planning for the war in Iraq.