The Veterans Administration’s inspector general is probing allegations that VA Secretary Robert Wilkie sought “damaging information” to smear the reputation of a senior veterans affairs policy adviser, after she reported she was sexually assaulted at a VA hospital in Washington, D.C. Andrea Goldstein, a staff member of the Women Veterans Task Force of the House veterans’ committee, reported last September that a man slammed her below the waist and pressed his body against hers as she tried to buy a snack at the medical center’s cafeteria. At the time of the alleged assault, Goldstein had just come from Capitol Hill, where she was working on a bill designed to curb sexual assault and harassment. In January, VA Secretary Wilkie called the sexual assault claims “unsubstantiated” in a letter to Goldstein’s boss. Goldstein responded in an op-ed, writing on the website Jezebel, “He used coded language, but the words still stung. The Secretary of the second largest federal agency knew how his words would resonate. … He was implying that I was a liar.”