Veterans at Santa Rosa clinic protest Trump's plans to cut jobs at VA
Amid ongoing federal employee layoffs ordered by the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency, one protest in the North Bay featured people who might traditionally be supportive of a conservative Republican president.
Outside the VA hospital in Santa Rosa, it wasn't a usual crowd of protestors. Veterans, many of them from the Vietnam War, were feeling betrayed.
"I thought it was pretty much hands off veterans, you know?" said Vietnam vet Joe Downing. "Nobody wants to say 'I sponsored a bill that cut the veteran's benefits.' But, being as Trump did it, all his lapdogs will do whatever he says."
There was plenty of anger about President Trump. Last week, 1,000 workers with the Department of Veterans Affairs nationwide were let go by Elon Musk's-led DOGE, with another 1,400 in the last few days.
A memo from the White House Chief of Staff on Tuesday laid out a nationwide plan to cut a total of 80,000 employees from the VA payroll. They are the workers the veterans rely on for healthcare.
"Be strong during this, and don't let fear take us over!" Katie Weber told the crowd of protestors. "We have to stay strong! We have to stay united!"
Weber, a disabled veteran since 2003, said many of the wounds suffered by military service members are as much mental as they are physical.
"We've already lost 2,400 people in two weeks," she said. "So, we have a problem if we lose any more. If we lose these folks, we're done! You're going to see suicides like you've never saw before."
For former Marine gunnery sergeant George Sager, the betrayal felt personal. The Vietnam veteran voted for Donald Trump in 2016 because he thought he would be a catalyst to force the two parties to work together.
"What I expected--that he would agitate both sides of the political spectrum--came to fruition, but..." Sager said he wasn't happy with the way things have turned out.
"My hope for the system is diminishing," he went on to say.
Wearing a "Friends of the NRA" cap, he's not the kind of guy one would expect to be at odds with a Republican president. But, like most veterans, he considers his VA benefits to be part of a sacred obligation.
"I made a contract with the U.S. government," Sager said. "I've held up my end of that contract to the best of my ability. The government is always trying to change that contract down to the smallest dollar amount that they possibly can."
And though it's something that seems hard to imagine, he thinks it's possible there may come a need to physically defend the country. Though Sager is now in his 70s and walks with a cane, the warrior who fought for his country more than 50 years ago said he would be willing to do it again.
"I'm willing to step forward if needed still today," he said. "To defend the country and the Constitution, if need be."
Did he think it would actually come to that? "I hope not," he said.
Each of the veterans at the protest carries some kind of scars from their service and are, in some ways, a casualty of war. Now they're wondering if they will also become a casualty of DOGE.
