Whether state courts may order the inclusion of veterans' disability benefits as income for purposes of calculating child support obligations, despite federal law prohibiting the garnishment or attachment of such benefits

QUESTIONS PRESENTED 1. In Rose v. Rose, 481 U.S. 619, 641-642 (1987), Justice Scalia stated in his | concurring opinion: | “] am not persuaded that if the Administrator [now Secretary of Veterans Affairs] makes an apportionment ruling, a state court | may enter a conflicting child support order. It would be extraordinary to hold that a federal officer’s authorized allocation of federally granted funds between two claimants can be overridden by a state official. EK I also disagree with the Court’s construction of 38 U.S.C. § 211(a), which provides that “decisions of the Administrator on any question of law or fact under any law administered by the Veterans’ Administration providing benefits for veterans and their dependents...shall be final and conclusive and no other | official or any court of the United States shall have power or jurisdiction to review any such decision.” The Court finds this inapplicable because it does not explicitly exclude state-court | jurisdiction, as it does federal...and because its underlying | purpose of “achiev[ing] uniformity in the administration of | veterans’ benefits and protect[ing] the Administrator from expensive and time-consuming litigation”...would not be impaired. I would find it inapplicable for a much simpler reason. Had the Administrator granted or denied an application to } apportion benefits, state-court action providing a contrary | disposition would arguably conflict with the language of § 211 making his decisions “final and conclusive” — and if so would | in my view be pre-empted, regardless of the Court’s perception , | that it does not conflict with the “purposes” of § 211. But there is absolutely no need to pronounce upon that issue here. Because the Administrator can make an apportionment only upon receipt of a claim...and because no claim for apportionment of the benefits at issue here has ever been filed, the Administrator has made no “decision” to which finality and conclusiveness can attach. Rose, 481 U.S. at 641-42 (emphasis added). Where the Secretary of the VA has denied a claim for apportionment of veterans’ disability benefits pursuant to 38 U.S.C. § 5307, may the state count these benefits as available income for purposes of a state court support order? 2. Where, after Rose, supra, Congress gave the Secretary of Veterans Affairs exclusive jurisdiction to “decide all questions of law and fact necessary to a decision” affecting “the provision of benefits...to veterans or the dependents or survivors of veterans,” see 38 U.S.C. § 511 (emphasis added); and, “as to any such question” made such decisions “final and conclusive” and unreviewable “by any other official or by any court,” id. (emphasis added); and created an Article I Court in the Veterans Judicial Review Act (VJRA), Pub, L. No. 100-687, 102 Stat. 4105, for exclusive | appellate review of such decisions, does a state court have jurisdiction or authority to directly or indirectly order a disposition of these benefits in a manner contrary to the initial benefit determination? 3. Congress’s enumerated military powers preempt all state law concerning | disposition of military benefits. Howell v. Howell, 137 S. Ct. 1400, 1404, , 1406 (2017). Where Congress has not affirmatively granted the state | authority to treat veterans’ benefits received by a non-retired, disabled service member as “income” for purposes of support obligations to dependents, and, in fact, excludes such benefits from being considered as income and affirmatively protects these benefits from “all legal and equitable process whatever” whether “before or after receipt” by the veteran, is Rose v. Rose, 481 U.S. 619 (1987), which ruled that the state could count such benefits as an available asset for purposes of calculating | | a disabled veteran’s support obligations in state court divorce proceedings, a legitimate basis for the State of Texas to usurp the Supremacy Clause and, in direct conflict with positive federal law, order Petitioner, a non