Legislators vow to help California guardsmen keep bonuses

WASHINGTON — Members of Congress in both parties vowed Tuesday to halt Pentagon efforts to force nearly 10,000 former California National Guard soldiers to repay bonuses they received in a deceptive scheme to get them to re-enlist for combat duty a decade ago.

More than $15 million in bonuses were paid fraudulently or mistakenly by state National Guard recruiters under pressure to meet recruitment goals during the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., on Tuesday demanded that the Pentagon “immediately suspend efforts to recover these overpayments,” and promised legislation “to protect service members from lifelong liability” for Defense Department mistakes.

There was nearly universal agreement in Congress that any money already repaid to the government by innocent service members would be returned and that the problem extends to other states as well.

The Pentagon has claimed it has no recourse but to demand repayment from the enlistees, but Rep. Mark Takano of Riverside, the top Democrat on the Veterans Affairs Committee, said Tuesday that Congress will make sure the money does not have to be repaid.

Both Republicans and Democrats pinned blame for the fiasco on the California National Guard, which they accused of underplaying the scope and urgency of the problem when it submitted its budget request two years ago.

Rep. Mark DeSaulnier, D-Concord, said the additional spending, supposedly targeted at combat soldiers and special forces at high risk, should have raised red flags when the bonuses were paid out a decade ago.

According to the Times, reports of fraudulent claims led to a federal investigation in 2010.

The California Guard’s incentive manager, Army Master Sgt. Toni Jaffe, pleaded guilty in 2011 to filing $15.2 million in fraudulent claims and was sentenced to more than two years in prison.

Rep. John Garamendi, D-Walnut Creek, who sits on the Armed Services Committee, has introduced legislation to stop the forced reimbursements and said it could be easily added to the pending defense bill and “signed before Christmas” by President Obama.