A compromise version of embattled legislation to extend compensation for victims of nuclear radiation is making the rounds in Congress, and advocates are making a new push for a vote before the end of the year.
A coalition of more than four dozen advocacy groups is calling on congressional leaders to attach the latest iteration of the bipartisan “Radiation Exposure Compensation Reauthorization Act” to “any appropriate year-end package,” hoping to jump-start the program nearly six months after Congress allowed it to expire.
“We are dying. Our family and friends in these affected areas have suffered horribly from nuclear fallout and waste,” the groups wrote in a letter shared first with POLITICO’s E&E News.
“For too long, our voices have been ignored,” states the letter addressed to House and Senate leaders. “It’s vital that this life-saving program that has been in place for decades is renewed and strengthened and attached to a year-end vehicle. It’s the right thing to do.”
The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA), first passed in 1990, provides financial compensation to individuals who have developed health conditions due to exposure to radioactive waste that originated from the government’s nuclear weapons testing practices during and after World War II.
A Senate-passed bill, S. 3853, sponsored by Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), would extend and expand the program to cover thousands more affected individuals but has been mired in disagreements over the cost. The latest version would cap costs at $5 billion, a small fraction of the original price tag.
The letter is signed by the Navajo Nation and close to 50 additional groups and marks the first time advocates are publicly coming out in favor of the significantly shrunken bill. It’s the latest flashpoint in what has been a protracted and sometimes contentious debate over the bill.
Many Republicans, led by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), have raised concerns that the proposed reauthorization is far too expensive.
Johnson has not put the bill up for a vote despite efforts by the bill’s sponsors to lower the costs. The original version was estimated to cost roughly $150 billion. It was pared down to $50 billion and now $5 billion.
“The House has to pass the bill that has passed the Senate,” Hawley said earlier this year. “If they don’t — they’ve already allowed the program to go off the cliff. I mean, nobody’s going to get anything.”
Individuals affected by nuclear radiation who have been unable to file new compensation claims since RECA lapsed in June have frequently visited Washington to urge lawmakers to support the bill.
Over the summer, members of the Navajo Nation who have become ill due to exposure to nuclear waste made a 37-hour bus trip to Washington where they begged Johnson to allow a vote on the bill.
Members of the Utah delegation have proposed a narrower, less expensive reauthorizaion. Two people familiar with talks on the legislation said Johnson has told members that if the Utah delegation gets behind the compromise proposal, he would too. The people were granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive negotiations.
However, a House Republican leadership aide said that assertion is “not an accurate characterization of where things stand on the issue.”
“Same differences still apply between the Senate proposal and House Republican Leadership,” said the aide in a text message. The person was also granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive negotiations.
Advocates on and off Capitol Hill are looking for legislative vehicles for the bill to be reconsidered in the coming weeks. That could include a spending package, a government funding extension or a disaster relief bill.
Hawley said Tuesday on social media that “any disaster relief package must include RECA — the Americans the federal government poisoned in Missouri and around the nation have been waiting for decades.”
