Burn pits: veterans exposed to toxic smoke
What they say
His campaign says that when veterans exposed to toxic burn pits were being turned away by the VA, he worked with Republicans to get them the care they deserved.
“Sherrod worked with Republicans to get them the care they deserved.”
What the record shows ·
In April 2021 he introduced S. 1188, the SFC Heath Robinson Burn Pit Transparency Act, with Senator Rob Portman of Ohio, a Republican, as its original cosponsor; he had first filed it with Portman in June 2020, as S. 3885. It did not pass on its own. Its registry provisions, that a VA medical professional must tell a veteran about the burn pit registry when the veteran seeks treatment related to exposure, and that registry numbers be published by state and congressional district, appear almost word for word in section 808(b) of Public Law 117-168, the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act of 2022. In February 2022 he was one of the original cosponsors, nine of them Republicans, of Senator Jon Tester's Health Care for Burn Pit Veterans Act, S. 3541, which passed the Senate by voice vote on February 16, 2022. Its sections extending VA health-care eligibility for combat veterans from five to ten years after discharge, and adding a toxic-exposure screening to VA health care, are in the same law almost word for word, as sections 111 and 603. In 2019 he was an original cosponsor, with Republicans including Dan Sullivan and Jerry Moran, of the Burn Pits Accountability Act, S. 191, whose requirement that military health assessments ask about burn pit exposure became section 704 of the defense authorization act for fiscal year 2020. He voted Yea on Senate passage of H.R. 3967 on June 16, 2022 (Roll Call 230, 84 to 14) and Yea on the final Senate vote on S. 3373 on August 2, 2022 (Roll Call 280, 86 to 11). It was signed on August 10, 2022.
Limit: The record shows him on three bipartisan burn pit bills whose text became law, one his own, and voting for the law that extended care. The care provisions came from a bill led by another senator that he cosponsored with Republicans; a cosponsorship shows he signed on, not what else he did. "Get them the care they deserved" describes the law as a whole, which passed the Senate 86 to 11.