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Sen. Bob Casey applauds watchdog report on Veterans Affairs

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FILE - Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, on Dec. 7, 2021. Casey, one of the last self-styled pro-life Democrats on Capitol Hill, said Tuesday, May 10, 2022, that he will support a bill to write abortion rights into federal law as Democrats scramble to respond to the Supreme Court’s leaked draft decision that would overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)

A United States Senator welcomes a watchdog report examining accessibility barriers at Veterans Affairs.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, D-Scranton, called for the report which found the VA consistently failed to make its websites fully accessible for people with disabilities as required by law, according to a news release.

Between 2019 and 2022, fewer than 11% of VA's public-facing websites were fully accessible and fewer than 9% of its internal websites were fully accessible, the report found.

Moreover, VA did not follow its own policies to ensure websites and technology were compliant with federal accessibility law, including a failure to track the accessibility of more than 200,000 internal websites.

The report was issued by the Department of Veterans Affairs Office of the Inspector General. Casey, chairman of the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging, released the following statement:

"I called for this report because the VA and the entire federal government needs to wake up to this issue. We would not ask someone using a wheelchair to walk up the courthouse steps, but we are doing something similar when we ask people with disabilities to use federal websites that are not accessible. The report shows that the Biden Administration has begun making long overdue progress on accessible technology at VA, but there is clearly more work to be done. I hope this report finally spurs the action that people with disabilities, older adults and veterans deserve."

The report issued six recommendations, including that VA establish mechanisms to ensure web accessibility policies are enforced across the department.

Starting at /week.