H.R. 5994 — Every Veteran Counts Act of 2025

This section states congressional findings regarding the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA) responsibilities for more than 19 million living veterans, past iterations of the National Survey of Veterans (conducted in the late 1970s, 1987, 1993, 2001, and 2010), and the need for enhanced data collection, analysis, and dissemination under 38 U.S.C. 527 and the Evidence Act to inform policymaking and meet evolving veteran needs.

This section establishes a database at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) for demographic data on veterans, to be collected from available sources including the National Center for Veterans Analysis and Statistics, Census Bureau, and Social Security Administration. The database must include data on sex; gender identity (disaggregated by male, female, cisgender, transgender, gender diverse, nonbinary, and combinations thereof); age; educational level; race and ethnicity (disaggregated by Indian tribe membership, as defined in 25 U.S.C. 5304, and major decennial census race groups); sexual orientation (disaggregated by heterosexual, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer); household makeup; gross income and sources; housing status (renter, homeowner, or residing in another person's home); employment status (employed, seeking employment, or self-employed); military service history (disaggregated by armed force, component, combat service, war period, POW status, exposure to dead/wounded, environmental hazards, and military sexual trauma); VA patient enrollment and disability rating status; residential location (rural/urban, distance to VA facility, broadband access); and other data deemed appropriate by the VA Secretary. Requires database data to be anonymized, machine-readable, and accessible via a public VA website updated at least annually, with implementation within 180 days of enactment.

This section requires the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to submit to Congress, not later than one year after the date of enactment of this Act, a report describing the progress, challenges, performance, and opportunities of implementing the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) data strategy. The report must include the following: (1) qualitative and quantitative progress toward strengthening VA data management, including business and mission impacts; (2) legislative recommendations to accelerate VA data management maturity; (3) progress in cataloging and inventorying data assets to support evidence-based policymaking and ethical dissemination of data, analysis, and open data; (4) progress implementing chapter 35 of title 44, United States Code (Paperwork Reduction Act), and related data quality efforts; (5) efforts toward a rules-based, transparent, department-wide approach to data management, integration, sharing, and access; (6) recommendations for adjustments to VA data requirements; (7) information-sharing agreements with other federal entities, including gaps addressable via existing federal surveys; (8) progress on relevant public laws, executive orders, presidential memoranda, and recommendations from the Comptroller General or inspectors general concerning veteran data collection, quality, integration, sharing, interoperability, and analytics to ensure equity in services; (9) current risk assessments for data breaches and information security (as defined in 38 U.S.C. §5727); and (10) priority data requirements identified through consultations with the Senate and House Committees on Veterans' Affairs, Congressional Budget Office, veterans service organizations, and VA advisory committees on minority, women, and homeless veterans. Not later than 30 days after submitting the report, the Secretary must publish it on the VA open data website in machine-readable format.