Good for veterans

I joined the Army because I wanted to be where my country needed me most: on the front lines in Vietnam.

The Army fit me; the deployments came and went until I hung up my uniform after more than 30 years of a job I loved. And now, like tens of thousands of my fellow veterans, I bear the scars of those days at war. Agent Orange is wreaking havoc on my body and PTSD lingers in my mind.

As a chaplain, I spent my career taking care of my fellow troops who put their lives on the line.

That’s why I’m grateful we have someone like Sen. Mark Pryor taking care of us veterans in Washington. He listens to our needs, and then works with anyone of any party to find real solutions for Arkansans.

You don’t have to look far to see the hard work Mark has done to protect veterans’ benefits and support military families. In the last year alone, Mark had two bills to fix the Veterans Administration backlog by cutting red tape in the filing process and finding ways to expedite electronic filing throughout the VA system.

And when a National Guard widow from Greenwood was denied death benefits because her husband died at home while on duty instead of on base, she asked Mark for help. Well, Mark took on the Pentagon and not only got her family’s benefits reinstated, he got that dumb law changed.

I believe Mark Pryor is the rare elected official that doesn’t just talk about honoring veterans, he’s got the record to show for it.

There’s an election coming up in November, and I know a big issue in Mark’s race will be his work for veterans. His opponent, Congressman Tom Cotton, served honorably in the infantry, but when it comes down to who voters can trust to deliver for military families, it’s a simple question: Who’s done more in Congress for veterans?

Congressman Cotton has yet to introduce a bill that does anything for veterans. Worse yet, Cotton supported legislation that benefits Wall Street bankers and voted to give tax breaks for millionaires, but he supported cutting military retirement benefits and pay for our combat troops. He even supported cutting TRICARE-health insurance for our troops and their families-and cheered on a government shutdown last fall that cost billions and threatened the pay for all of our military.

Who is he fighting for in Congress? Not veterans.

Then there’s Mark Pryor’s record. Mark successfully led the effort to keep the 188th Fighter Wing viable after losing their A-10s, which means keeping 300 full-time jobs here in Arkansas. When an Arkansas family couldn’t locate their son who was wounded in Iraq, Mark got legislation passed that implemented a new wounded warrior tracking system so families know which military hospital is caring for

their loved one. He helped pass a

law to give tax relief to troops in combat and their families at home and worked to upgrade medical equipment in combat field hospitals.

Mark wrote a law called the Helping Heroes Fly Act, which allows veterans like me who rely on medical aids to walk to have a less-invasive screening process at airports. And he got legislation passed to fix a cut to military pensions in the budget-but Tom Cotton has said he supports even deeper cuts to our pensions.

And when an Arkansas veteran or military family runs into a problem with the federal bureaucracy, Mark and his staff get to work. They’ve helped thousands of individuals with everything from VA benefit issues to recovering service medals. He values us for stepping up and answering the call. And I value him for stepping up and taking care of our families when we’re at war and veterans when our duty is done.

I respect Congressman Cotton as a fellow veteran, and that’s why I’m so disappointed that in Washington it seems he’d leave us veterans behind.

When it comes to honoring our men and women in uniform, I believe nobody gets it like Mark Pryor. He listens and works to take care of our fighting troops, older veterans like me and our families. That’s a senator who puts Arkansas first.

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Col. Jim Robnolt, a retired U.S. Army chaplain, lives in Sherwood.