Landmark Legislation For Service Members Hailed By Rep. Raul Ruiz

COACHELLA VALLEY, CA — Legislation that has a local lawmaker's fingerprint all over it passed the U.S. Senate Thursday, and President Joe Biden is calling it "the largest single bill in American history to address our service members’ exposure to burn pits and other toxic substances."

The original Honoring our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act of 2021 or the Honoring our PACT Act of 2021, passed in the U.S. House of Representatives in March earlier this year. The amended PACT Act passed in the Senate Thursday with bipartisan support and now will head back to the House for lawmakers to vote again. House leadership pledged to immediately take up the amended legislation and deliver the bill to President Biden’s desk for his signature.

The amended PACT Act would get approximately 3.5 million veterans health care for burn pit exposure and other toxins.

At the center the legislative package is language based on bills from Democratic Congressman Raul Ruiz, M.D. (CA-36): the Presumptive Benefits for War Fighters Exposed to Burn Pits and Other Toxins Act and the Veterans' Right to BREATHE Act, that establish a presumption of service connection between veterans’ military service and 23 diseases and rare cancers.

According to Ruiz, the Senate bill passed Thursday fulfills the vision of a Cathedral City veteran who died from pancreatic cancer developed from her service in Iraq.

Jennifer Kepner was an Air Force medic exposed to toxic burn pits which caused her to develop pancreatic cancer.

"She and her family faced roadblocks to getting the care that she needed from the (Veterans Affairs)," Ruiz said in his speech on the House floor urging passage of the legislation. "At her kitchen table, she asked me to lead this fight and I promised her that I would."

Ruiz said he's led the fight for presumptive benefits for veterans in memory of Kepner, whom he met in 2017, to get burn pit-exposed veterans access to health care they need. Ruiz represents the Coachella Valley and Pass Area.

"Today is a moment that is years in the making and brings us closer than ever before to getting burn pit-exposed veterans the benefits and care they have earned and deserve," Ruiz said. "I look forward to quickly sending this historic legislation to President Biden's desk."

The Jennifer Kepner HOPE Act was included in the Honoring our PACT Act to expand eligibility care "to veterans who participated in toxic exposure risk activities while serving on active duty, active duty for training or inactive duty training," according to a statement from Ruiz's office.

President Biden also released a statement Thursday about the Senate's PACT Act passage, calling it "the largest single bill in American history to address our service members’ exposure to burn pits and other toxic substances."

"This bill will provide expanded access to health care and disability benefits for veterans harmed by certain toxic exposures, whether in the jungles of Vietnam or the mountains of Afghanistan," Biden said. "It will also let the Department of Veterans Affairs move more quickly and comprehensively in the future to determine if illnesses are related to military service, and it will offer critical support to survivors who were harmed by exposures, including from water contamination at Camp LeJeune. Importantly, the bill includes the tools and resources to ensure that the VA can effectively implement it.

"I urge the House to swiftly pass this bill so I can sign it into law right away," the president said.