On Thursday, Rep. Chip Roy’s (TX-21) bipartisan, bicameral Supporting Families of the Fallen Act (S. 2794) passed the House of Representatives and now heads to the President’s desk.
Fellow original House co-sponsors of the legislation include Rep. Mike Levin (CA-49), Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (IA-2), and Rep. Elissa Slotkin (MI-8).The Senate version of the bill was introduced by Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL).
Rep. Roy gave the following remarks on the House floor ahead of the vote:
“I think one of the things that we have to remember is the extent to which our men and women in uniform have to be able to keep up, keep pace with inflation. And we thought this is important.
I had a constituent in my district who raised this issue, I sat down with that constituent and then met with a bunch of other constituents who were running into the same problem. I talked to a number of my veteran colleagues, and we believed that this was an important solution.
As many know, I’m not one to want to put forward legislation that isn’t paid for. This bill, for the most part, pays for itself with the slight exception of active duty combat individuals – and I believe that’s an exception worth making when we talk about things that are not paid for.
It’s straightforward. It simply increases the SGLI and VGLI maximum coverage from $400,000 to $500,000, so that servicemembers and veterans can customize the coverage amount that they need.
I think it’s a commonsense solution, it’s bipartisan, it’s bicameral, and I appreciate the chairman and ranking member for their support.
Sen. Tuberville said the following after the vote:
I’m very glad to see the House follow the Senate in passing this legislation. Congress has no higher priority than providing for our military and military families. This long-overdue increase in service members’ life insurance benefit coverage is one way the American people can honor the lives lost in defense of our country. I hope President Biden will sign the bill into law as soon as possible.
Rep. Levin said the following:
Those who serve our country deserve to know their families will be taken care of when they’re gone, but the life insurance they rely on hasn’t been updated in more than 15 years. That’s wrong, and we must do better for military families. I’m proud this bipartisan bill is now heading to the President’s desk to make long overdue increases to life insurance for servicemembers and veterans.
Full text of the bill can be found at the link here.
