The department is about 15% ahead of its claims workload pace from last summer.
Karen Brazell currently works as a senior VA advisor and would serve as the department's next Under Secretary for Benefits.
The appropriations plan would add more than $80 billion to the current VA funding level, giving the department its biggest budget ever.
Four Japanese troops were injured when a device suddenly exploded at a storage site for unexploded ordnance at the U.S. Air Force base on Okinawa.
