The institutions defrauded Veterans Affairs while cheating thousands out of career training, with some offering training on how to grow grass and make fake rocks, a Post investigation found.
By Craig Whitlock and Andrew Ba Tran
August 4, 2026 at 6:00 a.m. EDT
Illustration by Isabel Seliger for The Washington Post.
“In truth, the configuration of the program is so fundamentally flawed that almost anything goes at any price — and therein lies the problem,” said Barmak Nassirian, a vice president at Veterans Education Success, a Washington-based nonprofit that lobbies for GI Bill improvements. “I always wondered why the mob stuck to drug dealing and organized crime. Get into this racket. It’s easier money.”
VA requires schools to post course catalogues and calendars online, and to provide evidence to officials of “financial soundness.” But state regulators — and VA — pay almost no attention to what is going on in the classroom, said Nassirian, the vice president of Veterans Education Success.
“As long as the paperwork is right, the question of what did you teach and how much is a non-question,” he said.
Read the full article at The Washington Post here.