The House on Thursday passed what supporters are calling the most significant expansion of benefits in decades for some of the veteran community’s most vulnerable families, approving bipartisan legislation that would boost support for catastrophically wounded veterans and Gold Star families while expanding VA home loan access for National Guard and Reserve members. The legislation, the Sharri Briley and Eric Edmundson Veterans Benefits Expansion Act, passed the House by a vote of 235-179 and now heads to the Senate. According to House leaders and the bill’s sponsors, the measure would increase benefits for more than 7,000 severely disabled veterans and more than half a million Gold Star families. In a sit-down interview with Military.com before the vote, Rep. Tom Barrett, R-Mich., an Iraq War veteran, former Army helicopter pilot and the bill’s lead sponsor, described the legislation as a long-overdue effort to reaffirm America’s commitment to those who have borne the greatest costs of war.
“I think in the veteran community, we look at those who are surviving families and the most catastrophically injured as the ones deserving of the greatest consideration,” Barrett told Military.com. “This bill is really a reflection of that.”
