Multiple bipartisan veterans bills introduced and cosponsored by Sinema head to the President’s desk to be signed into law
WASHINGTON – Congress passed a legislative package containing several bipartisan veterans bills introduced and cosponsored by Arizona senior Senator Kyrsten Sinema that help ensure Arizona veterans receive the care and benefits they’ve earned.
Sinema’s bipartisan Nursing Home Care for Native Veterans Act, Honoring Families of Veterans Act, and Homeless Veterans Coronavirus Response Act all now head to the President’s desk to be signed into law.
“Arizona veterans selflessly served and sacrificed to keep our country safe and secure. It is our duty to ensure they receive the benefits they’ve earned and have access to the health care and economic resources they need,” said Sinema, a member of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee.
Sinema introduced her bipartisan Homeless Veterans Coronavirus Response Act with Republican Senator Dan Sullivan (AK). The bipartisan legislation brings relief and resources to the Department of Veterans Affairs’ Homeless Program Office by expanding its authorities to provide food, transportation, and communications technologies to homeless veterans and easing requirements that are especially onerous during the coronavirus pandemic.
Sinema introduced the bipartisan Nursing Home Care for Native Veterans Act with Republican Senator Kevin Cramer (ND) to support the construction of veteran nursing homes on tribal lands. Currently, there are no veteran nursing homes on tribal lands, which impacts rural tribal communities across the country. Tribal lands are excluded from a law that allows for 65 percent of construction costs of veteran nursing homes to be reimbursed. Sinema’s Nursing Home Care for Native American Veterans Act fixes this issue, allowing federal grant money to reimburse tribal veteran nursing home construction.
Sinema introduced her bipartisan Honoring Families of Veterans Act with Republican Senator John Boozman (AR) to guarantee all veterans and their families have access to the burial benefits promised to them. Sinema’s bill fixes a flaw that blocks the VA from putting the names of veterans’ family members on headstones in private cemeteries. Currently, the VA is only authorized to put veterans’ family members’ names on headstones in national, state veterans’, and tribal veterans’ cemeteries.
Congress also passed multiple Sinema-backed veterans priorities including the Deborah Sampson Act, Veteran Pension Protection Act, VA Tribal Advisory Committee Act, HEALTH Act, Veterans Improved Access and Care Act, and provisions from the Homeless Veterans Prevention Act, Caring for the Survivors and Families of Veterans Act, and Highly Rural Veterans Transportation Act.