Good morning and welcome to the kickoff of the National Veterans Small Business Week 2026. I'm Barb Carson. I'm the managing director of Programs and Policy at the D'Aniello Institute for Veterans and Military Families at Syracuse University. And this morning, together with co-host U.S. Small Business Administration, the D'Aniello Institute is proud to serve as a partner and convener, bringing together leaders across the public and private sectors to advance meaningful dialogue, strengthen collaboration, and create opportunities for those we serve. And I want to thank JPMorgan for hosting us at the Bowen Building, their Washington, D.C. headquarters, and for their enduring support of veteran business owners.
The theme of this year's National Veteran Small Business Week is Honoring Veteran-Owned, American-Made. American-Made stands for the quality, security, resilience, and national strength that we endeavor to achieve. And few Americans embody those values better than those of our veteran business owners.
As our nation celebrates its 250th birthday, we remember that veterans do not stop serving when they leave the uniform. They continue leading by starting businesses, hiring employees, innovating, strengthening Main Street, and powering America's industrial future. To every veteran today who's here, thank you for your service and thank you for everything you continue to build. The discipline, leadership, logistics expertise, technical skill, and mission focus that you developed in uniform makes veteran-owned manufacturers, suppliers, and contractors uniquely positioned to help rebuild America's industrial base. The veteran business owners here today are the inspired doers and risk-takers who make America great.
It's now my pleasure to welcome our co-host. Please join me in welcoming to the stage Assistant Administrator for the Office of Business Development, Kevin Barber, for his remarks, followed by Representative Roger Williams, chairman of the House Committee on Small Business.
Thank you, Barb. As Barb said, I'm Kevin Barber. I head up the Office of Veteran Business Development. I'm a former military police canine handler. I served with the 1st Infantry Division, 1st MP Company. And I'd also like to thank JPMorgan Chase for hosting us today. What a glorious morning to celebrate veterans and veteran entrepreneurship. And thank you to every veteran entrepreneur and military spouse joining us today, both in person and online. Thank you for your service to our country and for your contributions to our entrepreneurial ecosystem. We are also honored to be joined today by former Marine Corps corporal, Vice President of the United States, J.D. Vance; United States Small Business Administration Administrator, Kelly Loeffler; U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins; Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Doug Collins; and SBA Deputy Administrator, Bill Briggs. And of course, Representative Roger Williams, another great Texan and chairman of the House Committee on Small Business. Thank you all very much for your support.
As we honor Veterans Day, that's an all-star lineup. Sir, remember back when you played for the Braves? That's an all-star lineup right there. So, as we honor Veterans Day and kick off National Veteran Small Business Week, I want to share where the Office of Veteran Business Development is headed in 2027. Our theme for the year is From Warfighter to Founder: Own Your Next Mission. Every veteran here knows what a mission takes. You plan it, you lead your team through it, you adapt when the plan meets reality. Those are the same skills it takes to build a business. The uniform comes off, but the drive to succeed stays. Our job at the SBA is to make sure that drive is met with the training, capital, resources, and opportunities you've earned.
That starts with meeting veterans, military spouses, and current service members where they are. Last year, our VBOC, Veteran Business Outreach Centers, served more than 30,000 clients. More than 12,000 service members and military spouses participated in our Boots to Business program. We're also building infrastructure to go on to military installations for veterans who don't want to take Boots to Business but want to talk about entrepreneurship. And those numbers tell us something. Veterans want help, and they want it close to home. As you know, sometimes we have a hard time asking for help. That's why our VBOCs are so important. They speak our language. So we listened. This year, we are growing the VBOC network from 28 locations that we started the beginning of the year with to more than 51. New centers and satellites are opening in places like San Antonio, Orlando, Tacoma, and Baton Rouge, as well as communities across the country that have waited too long for a local partner.
San Antonio is a great example of Administrator Loeffler's leadership. Soon after joining SBA, she sat me down and she said, 'Kevin, I want a VBOC in San Antonio.' It was kind of like back in the day when your commanding officer gave you an order. It wasn't exactly something you were going to take your time getting around to. So we assembled the team, and we not only got San Antonio into our portfolio, but we also added Dallas, Houston, El Paso, and Austin. Ma'am, thank you very much for your unwavering support for our veteran community.
We're also putting resources where the market shows demand, near military installations and growing veteran communities, and in places where a new business can lift a local economy. We're also deploying capital resource partners that can deliver relevant training with measurable outcomes. This morning, you will hear from veteran founders, resource providers, and great patriots who support our veteran community every day. These veteran founders leveraged what they learned in uniform and turned skills into businesses, products, solutions, payrolls, and jobs. They answered our nation's call to serve again. So to every veteran thinking about the next step, your mission is waiting. And remember our theme: From Warfighter to Founder, Own Your Next Mission.
Now it's my honor to introduce one of our strongest voices in Congress, Representative Roger Williams, Chairman of the House Committee on Small Business, representing the 25th Congressional District of the great state of Texas. Mr. Williams was raised in Fort Worth and attended Texas Christian University. After graduating, he was drafted by the Atlanta Braves before eventually pursuing a career as a car dealer and head baseball coach at TCU. In 2005, Governor Rick Perry appointed him to serve as the Texas Secretary of State, where he helped usher in unprecedented economic growth in the state of Texas. In 2012, Mr. Williams was elected to Congress, where he's been a strong voice for Main Street America, small business, and families across the country. His real-world business experience has made him an effective leader and legislator. Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming Chair Williams.
Appreciate you. Is Secretary Rollins here? Well, I'll tell you, she's not here, but if she was, I'd tell you I sold her her first car when she was 16. And Doug Collins and I were freshmen together in Congress, so I know Doug will probably be here. But it's a real honor to be here and speak to all of you. I want to thank you for your service. Tell you a quick baseball story. Actually two, that'll be quick, but you heard I played for the Atlanta Braves. I played from '71 to about '78, and the most I ever made in the big leagues was $12,000. And the fellow that signed me, named Bobby Bragan, I saw him shortly before he passed away just several years ago. And I said, 'Mr. Bragan, guys like me that played in the '50s and '60s, we look at the game today, we think, what would I make if I was playing today?' I said, 'You know how I played, you drafted me. What would I make if I was playing today, do you think?' He said, 'Well, you could run, you could hit, you could throw, you can do some things.' But he said, 'Today, the environment's totally different.' But he said, 'Knowing how you played, if you were playing today,' he said, 'I think you would make $12,000.' So anyway, I'll just open by saying, you all remember, some of you guys remember a great pitcher named Satchel Paige. And Satchel in 1948 won both games of a doubleheader against the Yankees. Both games of the doubleheader. So in the locker room that night, they asked him, the press said, 'Satchel, you won both games of the doubleheader. What was your best pitch, curveball or your fastball?' And Satchel said, 'It was neither, it's my B ball.' They said, 'Your B ball? What's that?' He said, 'My B ball, when I throw it, it goes where I want it to be.' And I can't think of any place I'd rather be today than right here with all these great veterans and great Americans. And so thank you for having me here.
My background is I'm a small business owner back in Texas. You've heard I'm a car dealer. Does anybody want to buy a car? That's the next question. But I'm a car dealer, have been for 57 years. I know the greatness of small business. And you couldn't have anybody better than me chairing the committee. If it was you, you'd be the best, but I happen to be the one doing it. And I want to thank all of you for what you mean to the industry. You know, when you look at small business, 99% of the businesses in America are small businesses. 99%, just like all of ours. Half the payroll, half the workforce is generated by small business. And I tell people I'm not a Wall Street guy, I'm a Main Street guy. Back in Texas, we call it, might be Yahoo Street. But the fact of the matter is, small businesses like yours, the ones you're going to start, the ones you have now, drive this economy. Drive this economy. So I want to thank you for $1.3 trillion in veteran sales in this country. $1.3 trillion. That's a lot of money. I want to thank you for $283 billion in payroll, generating payroll, putting money in the economy, putting money down Main Street, putting money to hire people, create opportunity, create jobs. You're doing that. I want to say thanks. And the Boots to Business program is a great program. You mentioned it. We need to take advantage of that. I've had the honor of representing Fort Hood for 12 years. I got redistricted out of Fort Hood, but I'm still their guy. And so forth.
So the opportunity out there is unbelievable to get a business started, keep it going. I can't help but talk about the big beautiful bill real quick from a businessman's perspective. The fact is you got two things. You got taxes that are fixed now. You've got regulations that are drastically reduced. Is there anybody in here that's under-regulated in their business? Would you raise your hand? I don't think so. So we cut regulations. We got taxes. We cut taxes. Now you know what you can make. 100% expensing. What a great thing for a new business to be able to buy equipment, create new jobs and so forth, and be able to write it off. You got it, because that saves you that much money this year to go out next year and go hire people, expand your business, and get with it, and go see the SBA and get you a loan that'll get you started and help you get finished. So there's great opportunity out there for you. It's never been, like I say, I've been in business since 1971. I've seen it all. I've seen 0%, I've seen 20%, I've seen it all. But right now is the greatest opportunity to start a business because lenders are there. The SBA, under Kelly Loeffler's leadership, is just doing great, fabulous things. Our loans are up 75% over what they have been. And people want to do business. They want to get into business. They're willing to take risk. This country was built on risk and reward, where you could risk something and get reward. We always maintain that. That's what built it. Nothing else built it, but entrepreneurship and so forth. So it's a great environment to be where you're doing. It's a great environment to be able to borrow money, save money, and put people to work. I, as your chairman of the committee, I'm going to be right with you because I'm doing the same thing. I'm having to borrow money every day. I have to draw on a line of credit. I have to deal with employees. I've got over 300 employees, and I know what it's like to meet a payroll and put something on the shelf and try to get rid of it. And if it gets aged, you got to get rid of it to get cash and those kind of things. And I get that just like you do. You deal with it every day. So have that in mind. And Kelly Loeffler understands that too as a businesswoman. So we're in this thing together. But you got great opportunities. Couldn't be more proud of what you do and some of the things that are happening. And I will fight for all that every single day I'm chairman of the committee and I'm in Congress.
So the next thing is that we make sure we give you access to capital. Access to capital could be the hardest thing there is to start your business. The SBA does that. The banks are beginning to do that. We reduced banking regulations drastically to where they could do that. It got to where it was so tough on community banks it was almost cheaper not to make the loan than to make the loan, and so forth. But we got that back. Now the entrepreneurship is happening, and people are anxious to take risk and be a part of what you're doing.
So let me kind of close by saying this. We got a lot going on, AI and the whole thing. Who's going to stay? Who's going to not? And that quarter thing. But the opportunities that we have, the jobs I tell people that we need, you know, in Texas, we have 100,000 kids dropping out of ninth grade of school every year in Texas. 100,000 kids because they're losing hope. They don't think they can be this. They don't think they'll be a lawyer. They don't think they can be an architect. But you know what they can be? They can be a plumber, welder, carpenter. They can be in the nursing schools. They can be in sales. They can do things. There's so many jobs. Those jobs will never be taken by AI. And that's a job that when somebody calls you, they don't ask, 'Hey, how much you going to charge me?' Mainly just, 'When are you going to get here?' And there's so many great opportunities out there, but we promote it. We got great bills that help promote and remind young students what it costs to go to a state school, what it costs to go to a trade school. And student debt and all that can be eliminated if people will understand that there's great opportunity out there in those, and they will not go away. We promote the heck out of that, and that's going to be the savior of an economy. You don't have an economy until you have plumbers, welders, carpenters.
I'll tell a quick story. In Texas, when I was Secretary of State, we were a week away from going down to Corpus Christi and cutting a ribbon for a billion dollars in capital improvement down in Corpus Christi. And a week before it happened, I get the call from the company and say, 'Well, Mr. Secretary, we're not going to come to Texas. We're going to Michigan.' I said, 'You're going to Michigan?' I said, the Sunday evening coming up in Michigan, and they're unhappy. They don't smile. They don't introduce themselves to you. I said, 'What are you going there for?' He said, 'It was pretty simple. We're going to Michigan because Texas has no welders.' And it kept that on my head forever. We need more welders, carpenters, plumbers. And so many of the people coming out of the military and out of the industry are ready to go. And the great thing about hiring a veteran is a veteran knows you got to get there first and you got to get there last if you run a business. And sometimes you may not get paid, but you take care of your employees. So it's a great environment to be in right now. It's the greatest group in the world, our veterans.
We need to continue to do more for you, but I promise you I will be one of those that says we need to cut taxes, we need to cut regulations, we need to create opportunity. And we don't need to compete against the government. I will compete against you, but I don't want to have to compete against the damn government because that's one you never win. But if we can compete against each other, we will drive prices down. And who will benefit most of all? It'll be the consumer because they will tell us your service is good, your service is bad, your price is too high, your prices are too low. They will tell us. We don't need the government to tell us. Get out of my life and do three things: collect my taxes, defend my borders, and help with infrastructure, and get the hell out of the way. That's where I am. That's where you are. I couldn't be more proud to be able to talk to you today. I couldn't be more proud of what you're doing. Could not be more proud of being associated with the SBA. Kelly Loeffler and all her team, it's great. We got business people doing great things. And if you were my car salesman, I would close the sales meeting by saying, 'Sell, sell, sell. Take three no's today and call them back tomorrow.' And get after it, give service, and thank God that we live in the greatest country in the world, the one we call the United States of America. Thank you very much.
Well, good morning. Thank you, Chairman. What an honor to open National Veteran Small Business Week together. Thank you all. I couldn't be more thrilled to open this week, which is honoring veteran-owned, American-made. I mean, think about those concepts. I can't really think of anyone who embodies that more than our nation's 50th Vice President, probably the greatest Vice President in American history. You think about his humble beginnings. 23 years ago, he graduated from high school and enlisted in the Marine Corps, rising to the rank of Corporal. You layer on to that, he became an entrepreneur himself when he was a veteran. I mean, this is what we're talking about today. What veterans bring to America: the discipline, the know-how, the expertise, the resilience. That's what we're celebrating today, and that's why I'm so proud to introduce our nation's 50th Vice President, J.D. Vance.
Guys. Please, thank you. Have a seat. Have a seat. First of all, I want to thank our amazing small business administrator, a person who cares a lot about our small businesses, but of course about our veterans, and thank the folks at JPMorgan Chase for helping make this event possible, but also putting so many resources into veteran-owned small businesses. And before I get into the meat of my remarks, I wanted to talk about the devastating loss last week. And just a little bit about that. You know, of course, there's a lot of people, I think, unfairly criticizing the leader of the team despite leading us to a great victory two years ago. A lot of people criticizing unfairly the leader of the team. There are a lot of staff infighting and questions about reshuffling. And of course, there's a conversation about whether the number two has what it takes to ultimately lead the team. I'm talking, of course, about the Ohio State Buckeyes. And let me just assure you that I really believe in Luke Fickell, our backup quarterback, and I think our team is going to make an amazing, amazing turnaround here. But any Ohio people here? A few? Okay. All right.
Here's the thing. Politics aside, what we care about in the Trump administration is job growth, and we care about our national security, and we care about ensuring the people who create the next generation of jobs also ensure the next generation of American national security. And that's why I'm so proud to be here. This room stands at the intersection of all these amazing, amazing priorities for us as an administration, but also for the United States of America writ large. And I'm very proud of Kelly for a number of reasons, but one of those is that we have seen, I believe, $1.3 billion under her leadership go into veteran-backed small businesses from the SBA. And what that means is more money for you to hire, more money for you to train, more money for you guys to build out and expand your products. You guys are in many ways the backbone of the economy, but we think at the government you should have a little bit of support from your government as opposed to just people making it harder and harder for you to do your job.
Now, another reason I'm very proud of Kelly is that she has been one of the leaders, if not the leader in the administration, in combating fraud. She's one of the people who has been so good at ensuring that the money that goes to our small businesses actually goes to the small businesses. That sounds common sense, but you guys may not appreciate that over the last six or so years, particularly after the COVID era money started to get dispersed writ large, there was a massive explosion of fraud in the system that we had in the United States of America. And because of that, money that should have been going to small businesses, veteran-backed and others, was actually going to fraudsters. And what we've tried to do is double down on ensuring that anybody who applies for an SBA loan is actually entitled to receive an SBA loan. What that also means, of course, is more money in your pockets in order for you to build your businesses and grow your businesses. And that's something that we're very proud of.
Now we also know, as you all know, unlike most small businesses, the veteran-owned small businesses recognize how important national security is. I think it's in your blood, it's in your bones. You understand it at a very instinctive level. And Kelly has been telling me all things that I didn't even appreciate as vice president about how important it is for our small businesses to contribute to our industrial supply chain for national security. Whether it's a Patriot missile or whether it's the 1,200 small businesses that support the people who are developing the sidearms for our troops, without support from our small businesses, our troops wouldn't have what they need in order to keep us safe. And so it's not just about job creation, it's not just about economic growth, it's also about many of you helping build the industrial foundation of the United States of America so that if God forbid we ask our troops to go and do something very difficult, they have weapons by their side, one that actually work and two that were made by their fellow citizens and in some cases their fellow veterans. And that is another reason why we're so supportive of all the work that you guys are doing.
Let me just say a few other things here. You know, when I was, I guess I did to Kelly's point, I had a veteran-owned small business myself. That's what I did before I got into politics. I was an investor in Cincinnati, Ohio, and we built a business around investing in and helping young technology companies grow. I invested in veteran-owned small businesses. I invested in companies that were building the industrial supply chain for weapons. So before I got into politics, I had a pretty good sense of what you guys were doing day-to-day, and I had a great appreciation for how important it was to the economy. But I also try to understand the data. So I have some personal experience with it, but one of the most shocking facts, I think it's an uplifting fact, but it is kind of shocking when you realize that the net job growth in the United States of America comes from our small businesses. You know, our big businesses, they grow and they shrink, they hire people and they fire people, but on net, our big businesses, no offense to our friends at JPMorgan, they tend to not be a net contributor to job growth in our country. The net contributor to job growth in our country is you all. And one of the things that sets the United States apart even from some of our peer economies in Europe and other parts of the world is that we have a vibrant small business ecosystem. Whatever you did, whether you were a veteran who served our country or whether you were just a citizen who...
worked at a company and thought you had a good idea, you thought you had an idea for how to do something better, the innovation ecosystem that we have in our country, whether you're creating a two- or three-person service firm in your hometown or whether you're creating a new business that you want to grow into a multi-million dollar company, you guys are the backbone of American innovation. And so our commitment in the Trump administration over the next couple of years is that under the president's leadership, we are going to put hundreds of millions of dollars this year, and I think billions of dollars over the next couple of years, into continuing to support our veteran-owned small businesses. And the one request that I would have — I see some great congressional leaders here, I see a lot of people here who are leaders in their communities, all of you are in your own way — is talk to us and tell us what we can do better, tell us how we can better support veteran-backed businesses in our communities. We want you guys to thrive and succeed. I want you to hire people. I want you to bring more people into your companies. I want you guys to build and expand if that's what you want to do. I want you to continue to make great products.
You know, one of the lessons that we learned over the past 20, 30, 40 years — pretty much my entire life — is that we stopped appreciating how important it was to have industrial resilience in your own country. We started to think of the economy as this thing that just existed in the world and it didn't matter whether something was made in Mexico or China or in Middletown, Ohio. So long as we could get access to it, that's all that mattered. Well, I think we all learned during COVID, and frankly we should have learned the lesson well before then, that sometimes when you rely on other countries to make those critical components, they're not always there. And I don't know about you, but I'd much rather rely on my fellow citizens to build and make and create the economy of the future, because I know that my fellow citizens are going to be there — not just for me, not just for my family, but for everybody in the United States of America. So I guess my final thought here is keep doing what you're doing and let us know in the Trump administration how we can do a better job supporting our small businesses and our veteran-owned small businesses. Ladies and gentlemen, we're rooting for you because you root for the United States of America and we're very much on your team. Thank you all. Good to see you.
Thank you for your service. God bless you guys. Thank you.
We're only going to do this once, folks. Vice President is gone, but great motivational words from him today.
Didn't see that coming. [laughter] No, but there's obviously a purpose for that. So, but again, what a great day to come together. Can't say enough about the vice president coming and spending his very valuable time here with you. It's truly an honor to have him here as a young Marine. I'm sure he didn't realize when he took his uniform off that someday he would become vice president of the United States. It just shows that anything is possible in the United States, especially after you come out of your service. It's the great equalizer. And talk a little bit about that later, but what a joy to have the sitting vice president come and talk to you about veteran entrepreneurship, his story, the fact that he's been in your seat. You know, he knows what it's like to sign the front of a check. He knows what it's like to make payroll, to be up late at night and wondering what's going to happen tomorrow. You know, are you going to make payroll? So, and then your story too. It's just so many great stories out there. We're going to share a lot of that on these fireside chats that we're going to have next.
But I'd like to introduce our first fireside chat that brings together the SBA administrator and what I like to say, the architect of the new SBA, the honorable Kelly Loeffler, and Mr. Troy, co-president of JPMorgan Chase and CEO of Consumer and Community Banking. Administrator Loeffler is a self-made businesswoman. She worked on her family's farm, attended public school, waited tables, and became the first in her family to graduate from college. She built a three-decade career in financial services and technology, including as an executive at Intercontinental Exchange. She then served Georgia in the US Senate. Today she serves President Trump as a cabinet-level voice for America's 36 million small businesses. And she has worked tirelessly to rebuild the SBA into an America First engine for free enterprise. Moderating today's conversation is Tim Barry, global head of corporate responsibility and chairman of the Mid-Atlantic region for JPMorgan Chase. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Administrator Kelly Loeffler, Troy, and Tim Barry.
Mike, okay, good. I think the administrator is getting her mic fixed, so — but thank you everybody for being here today. Tim Barry, global head of corporate responsibility at JPMorgan. And to the veterans in the room, on behalf of all of us at JPMorgan Chase, thank you for your service.
Yeah, come on, [laughter] join us. Yeah.
Yeah. As we kick off National Veteran Small Business Week, it's a great time to talk about what veteran entrepreneurs need to start, build, and grow their business. At JPMorgan Chase, we've long been committed to supporting veterans and military families, including helping veteran entrepreneurs access capital, resources, and opportunities. So we are very honored today to be joined by SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler, who leads the SBA's work to support small businesses and entrepreneurs across the country. She brings decades of experience in business and entrepreneurship as well as public service to the role. So thank you for being here.
Thank you. It's an honor.
Yeah. I'm also joined by my colleague Troy, co-president of JPMorgan Chase and CEO of Consumer and Community Banking. Troy oversees a business that serves more than 88 million customers and 7.8 million small businesses across the country, giving him a broad perspective on the opportunities and challenges facing business owners today. So thanks, Troy, for being here.
