Sharri Briley and Eric Edmundson Veterans Benefits Expansion Act of 2026

Floor Speech

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Mr. BOST. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 1300, I call up the bill (H.R. 6047) to amend title 38, United States Code, to direct the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to increase the dollar amounts for the payment of certain disability compensation and dependency and indemnity compensation under the laws administered by the Secretary, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

The Clerk read the title of the bill.

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Mr. BOST. 6047, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 6047, as amended, the Sharri Briley and Eric Edmundson Veterans Benefits Expansion Act, introduced by my friend and fellow veteran, Representative Tom Barrett.

I will speak to you today about some of the great Americans this bill will impact.

Sharri Briley is the survivor and spouse of Chief Warrant Officer 3 Donovan ``Bull'' Briley, an Army Special Operations pilot killed in 1993 in Somalia.

Most Americans would be more familiar with the movie adaptation of that harrowing day, the film ``Black Hawk Down,'' but for Sharri Briley, this was not Hollywood.

This was her husband and the father of her then-5-year-old daughter.

Donovan gave his life in defense of freedom, the type of sacrifice we will commemorate on Memorial Day.

This legislation would provide the first meaningful increase in survivor benefits for families like Brileys since 1993.

Over 500,000 survivors like Sharri receive Dependency and Indemnity Compensation from the VA.

DIC is a monthly payment of $1,700 meant to help supplement lost income after a servicemember's death.

It has only been adjusted for inflation over the last 30 years, but this bill would add an extra 1.5 percent to the DIC over the next 2 years.

I also will discuss Sergeant Eric Edmundson.

When Eric was 25, his vehicle was destroyed by an IED on the Syrian border. His spleen ruptured. His kneecap shattered. His spine fractured, and he sustained traumatic brain injury. For 30 minutes, Eric's heart stopped beating.

Eric was transported to Walter Reed Army Medical Center to recover, but his injuries left him unable to walk or speak. For the past 20 years, his parents, Edgar and Bethany, and his wife, Stephanie, have been Eric's full-time caregivers, supporting Eric as they work together to raise Eric's two kids.

Despite these injuries, his family has empowered him to live as full a life as possible--hunting, painting, spending time with his children, and going to church.

As the Edmundson family recently wrote in an op-ed for Stars and Stripes: ``Two incomes vanished. The expenses multiplied. When a service-connected injury permanently removes earning capacity, the math doesn't bend for patriotism.''

This bill recognizes that and would provide a $10,000 increase to the 7,000 severely disabled veterans like Eric, many of whom require 24/7 around-the-clock professional medical care.

Veterans like Eric receive the three highest tiers of disability compensation called R1, R2, and T. Many of these veterans will never work again and cannot perform basic tasks.

Eric's family dedicate their lives making sure Eric, one of our Nation's most wounded soldiers, continues living with dignity.

Mr. Speaker, this bill is for families like the Brileys and the Edmundsons.

As the families put it in their recent op-ed, the circumstances are different, but the consequences are the same: ``The cost of military service does not end when the ceremony and the headlines fade. It echoes through decades--through college tuition bills, medical equipment invoices, mortgage payments, retirement plans that must be deferred or abandoned altogether.''

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record the op-ed referred to published in Stars and Stripes. [From the Stars and Stripes, May 18, 2026] Congress Is Debating the Details. Our Military Families are Living the Consequences (By Sharri Briley and Edgar ``Ed'' Edmundson)

One of us lost her husband, Army Chief Warrant Officer Donovan ``Bull'' Briley, when he was killed in action in Somalia in 1993. In a single moment, I became a Gold Star widow--raising our children while trying to build a future shaped by grief and the long financial shadow that follows permanent sacrifice. The folded flag did not close a chapter; it began a lifetime of responsibility.

The other nearly lost his son. Eric Edmundson suffered a severe brain injury while serving in Iraq. He cannot walk. He cannot speak. He requires constant, round-the-clock care. He will never return to work--and his parents cashed in their retirement to care for him. Two incomes vanished. The expenses multiplied. When a service-connected injury permanently removes earning capacity, the math does not bend for patriotism.

Our circumstances are different, but the consequence is the same: the cost of military service does not end when the ceremony and the headlines fade. It echoes through decades-- through college tuition bills, medical equipment invoices, mortgage payments and retirement plans that must be deferred or abandoned altogether.

That is why the Sharri Briley and Eric Edmundson Veterans Benefits Expansion Act of 2025 matters and why Congress must act. The legislation offers a long overdue increase in compensation for the most catastrophically wounded and ill veterans and offers a down payment on desperately needed increases to Dependency and Indemnity Compensation for survivors. In plain terms, it would update benefits that have not kept pace with the true cost of severe injury or loss of life.

As reported by Military Times, the proposal would add roughly $10,000 annually for veterans with the most severe disabilities and modestly increase monthly survivor benefits--an adjustment long overdue as living and care costs continue to rise.

What is being considered in Washington may look like numbers on a page. To families like ours and so many other Americans, it is the difference between a road toward stability and a financial cliff.

The impact of service is not confined to two households. A landmark Rand Corp. study estimates that 14.3 million Americans are caring for wounded, ill or injured service members and veterans. More than 500,000 Americans are navigating life as surviving spouses. The ripple effects of war extend far beyond the battlefield--and far beyond a single generation.

For decades, compensation for the most catastrophically disabled veterans and survivor benefits have not been meaningfully adjusted to reflect modern realities. Catastrophic injury is permanent. Widowhood caused by war is permanent. The obligations do not shrink with time--they compound.

Accessible housing must be maintained. Specialized equipment must be repaired or replaced. Therapy continues. Children grow up. Savings are stretched thin. None of this is abstract. It defines daily life.

We recognize that lawmakers have a responsibility to examine how legislation is structured and funded. That scrutiny is part of governing. But delay is not neutral. Every year that passes without modernization forces those living with the most severe consequences of service to absorb costs that were never meant to be borne alone.

This is not about comfort. It is about dignity.

It is about ensuring that a veteran who cannot walk or speak can live with security. It is about ensuring that a surviving spouse can raise children without wondering whether gratitude from a nation will translate into financial stability.

We are grateful--for survival, for sacrifice, for the honor of loving those who served. But gratitude does not pay a mortgage. It does not fund adaptive equipment. It does not replace lost earning power.

Service members are not wounded as Republicans or Democrats. They are wounded as Americans. The promise to care for them--and for those who live with the lifelong consequences of their service--should rise above party lines just as clearly.

This legislation now stands before leadership in the U.S. House of Representatives. The question is not whether the need exists--it does. The question is whether Congress will act with the urgency that lifelong sacrifice demands.

Because the financial cliff facing those most profoundly affected by war--like our families--is not rhetorical. And once stability is lost, rebuilding can take years, if it is possible at all.

Our loved ones answered the call without hesitation. It is time for our leaders to do the same--not with speeches, but with action that honors veterans, survivors and the enduring cost of service. It is time for Congress to pass the Sharri Briley and Eric Edmundson Veterans Benefits Expansion Act of 2025.

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Mr. BOST. Mr. Speaker, this bill would also expand VA home loan eligibility to members of the National Guard and Reserve who have at least 14 days of Active-Duty service at a 1 percent higher rate.

Today's Guard and Reserve deploy along Active-Duty servicemembers. They deserve a broader access to VA homeownership opportunities, as well.

Mr. Speaker, I also will address the offsets in this legislation because there has been a great deal of misinformation surrounding them.

The fact is that House Republicans chose to follow the House rules and the law. We fully paid for this legislation so that we could get this bill done because promises made to veterans should be promises Congress can keep and not show votes or fake outrage to get clicks and votes.

Now, let me be clear about what this bill will not do. This bill will not eliminate or harm the VA Home Loan Program. It would also not impose a loan fee on any disabled veteran, and it would not eliminate zero percent down on a VA home loan.

Instead, this bill contains two bipartisan offsets that would extend current home loan fees and would extend the current cap on certain veterans' pensions who are in government-funded nursing care. It also increases the home loan funding fee that families would pay when refinancing by a small amount.

During the 116th Congress, then-Chairman Takano supported and voted in favor of a similar funding fee proposal on refinancing VA home loans. I find the arguments against our similar proposal today insincere. It reeks of the type of politics our veterans don't deserve.

Mr. Speaker, I am a veteran. If I thought that this bill would harm veterans, you can trust I would not bring the bill to the floor. But, as the saying goes, don't take my word for it, because over 22 veterans service organizations support this legislation as written. Let me repeat: The veterans groups like the VFW, The American Legion, the Disabled American Veterans, and many others support the bill. These organizations represent millions of veterans and military families who support this legislation because they know these families cannot afford to wait another decade for Congress to act.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a joint letter from 20 veterans organizations supporting the bill. February 9, 2026. Hon. Mike Bost, Chairman, Committee on Veterans' Affairs, House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Hon. Mark Takano, Ranking Member, Committee on Veterans' Affairs, House of Representatives, Washington, DC.

Dear Mr. Chairman & Ranking Member: As the second session of the 119th Congress begins and the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs continues its work providing for the needs of our nation's ill and injured veterans, their caregivers, and survivors, we write to share our strong support for the amendment in the nature of a substitute to H.R. 6047, the Sharri Briley and Eric Edmundson Veterans Benefits Expansion Act. As you proceed with discussions around this bill, we urge you to remember those with whom the bill is intended to help--veterans with the profoundest of injuries and the survivors who have lost their loved ones. Provisions in this important legislation would increase the amount of Special Monthly Compensation (SMC) by $10,000 annually for the most severely disabled veterans and raise the rate of Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC) by a total of 1.5 percent over a period of two years for the surviving family members of deceased servicemembers and veterans.

SMC is arguably the most important ancillary benefit for veterans with severe, service-connected disabilities. To be clear, given the extreme nature of the disabilities incurred by most veterans in receipt of SMC, we do not believe that the impact on quality of life can be totally compensated for; however, SMC does at least provide these veterans an opportunity to have the financial resources to accommodate their individual needs.

DIC is intended to protect against survivor impoverishment after the death of a service-connected veteran. These monthly payments were intended to provide surviving spouses with the means to maintain some semblance of economic stability after the loss of their loved one. DIC is also an indemnity payment from the government for the loss of life. Unfortunately, without an immediate increase, many survivors who, in many cases were once caregivers, face a financial cliff with catastrophic results. This legislation represents an initial downpayment on what is truly owed to veterans' survivors, and we are committed to continuing to work to bring DIC in parity with other federal survivor benefits.

Congress established the baseline rates for these crucial programs decades ago and updating them is long overdue. The time to act is now. For decades, the veteran community has urged Congress to strengthen these critical support programs and increasing SMC and DIC would be the first step in helping our most severely disabled and their survivors. Passing this important legislation will provide critical relief to these communities and we look forward to your swift action. Sincerely,

Paralyzed Veterans of America; Elizabeth Dole Foundation; Wounded Warrior Project; Disabled American Veterans; Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors; Military Officers Association of America; Jewish War Veterans of the USA; Vietnam Veterans Association; Quality of Life Foundation; Gold Star Wives of America, Inc; Commissioned Officers Association of the USPHS; AMVETS; The Independence Fund; Military Order of the Purple Heart; Blinded Veterans Association; Fleet Reserve Association; Marine Corps League; Gold Star Spouses of America; Armed Forces Retiree Association.

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Mr. BOST. Mr. Speaker, additionally, I include in the Record a joint letter from ROA, MCRA, and EANGUS in support of expanding VA home loan programs to include Guard and Reserve members with 14 days of Active Duty. January 13, 2026. Hon. Tom Barrett, House of Representatives, Washington, DC.

Dear Representative Barrett: On behalf of the members represented by our respective organizations, thank you for your leadership in offering the Home Affordability for Guard and Reserve Act as an amendment to H.R. 6047, the Sharri Briley and Eric Edmundson Veterans Benefits Expansion Act of 2025.

This amendment expands VA home loan eligibility to Reserve and National Guard servicemembers who are currently ineligible under law. Specifically, it broadens the definition of ``active duty'' to include qualifying service under Title 10, Title 14, and Title 32 orders, as well as training duties, and applies retroactively to service performed on or after September 11, 2001. Further, eligible individuals who have completed at least 14 days of qualifying service and remain in the Reserve or National Guard may access VA home loans, subject to an additional 1 percent funding fee.

Our organizations support this amendment. However, if the broader package does not advance, we urge you to move your amendment forward under regular order as a standalone measure.

At the same time, we reaffirm our longstanding support for provisions that guarantee equal fees for all servicemembers. Introducing different fee structures based on component or category of service risks creating inequities and discrimination within the program.

Accordingly, we urge a thorough review of the proposed additional fee in Section 3 of the amendment, along with the broader fee adjustments in the bill, to evaluate their impact on the VA home loan program's purchasing power, solvency, and the break-even horizon for veterans when refinancing. Without such scrutiny, these changes risk diminishing the program's affordability and pricing out the very servicemembers it was designed to support.

Should the review conclude that these adjustments make housing under the program unaffordable or significantly extend the break-even horizon in a way that compromises the program's intended flexibility, we strongly recommend reconsideration and appropriate corrective action.

Thank you again, Congressman, for your leadership. We appreciate your attention to these concerns and stand ready to assist in moving this amendment forward. Respectfully, John B. Hashem, Major General, USA Retired, Executive Director, Reserve Organization of America. Paul K. Hopper, Colonel, USMC Retired, National President, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve Association. John D. Gipe, Command Sergeant Major, USA Retired, Executive Director, Enlisted Association of the National Guard.

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Mr. BOST. Mr. Speaker, veterans deserve more than speeches. They deserve results.

If you support these benefit increases, then you need a serious plan to pay for them, because simply saying that someone else will figure it out later, that is not real leadership.

Mr. Speaker, this bill comes down to a simple question: When America sends our soldiers off to war, the result sometimes is life-changing injuries, grieving spouses, and full-time caregivers. Will this country stand behind them later in the years?

Again, I ask my Democrat colleagues: If veteran groups support the bill, then why in the world don't you?

Mr. Edgar Edmundson testified before the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, and he asked Congress to stop the politics and get this done.

Mr. Speaker, families like the Edmundsons and the Brileys deal with the reality most Americans never see. The Brileys answered the call to serve. The Edmundsons answered the call to serve. Now, Congress must answer their call.

This legislation, these families, and the thousands of families like them, we have your back. It is a distinct honor to advance this bill just before Memorial Day.

I urge all Members to support H.R. 6047.

Mr. Speaker, while I appreciate my colleagues for suddenly wanting to be fiscally responsible, I do not appreciate my colleagues implying that the home loan funding fee as an offset is unnecessary or inappropriate. Finding a way to pay for expenditures and benefits is not an option. It is a requirement.

May I remind my colleagues and Ranking Member Takano that he has supported dozens of bills that contain the home loan funding fee. My colleague has also submitted a manager's amendment on the floor to increase fees for refinancing loans in the 116th Congress. While the offer used by the ranking member only increased fees, refinancing loans by 0.5 percent and 0.85 percent, and was only a temporary increase, the concept still remains the same.

This legislative body has long understood that fiscal responsibility is not separated from caring for our veterans and their survivors. It is part of that responsibility.

The House has repeatedly relied on adjustments to the VA home loan funding fee to pay for veterans' benefits expansions. Members on both sides of the aisle have voted for that approach many times. As chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, I don't just pay lipservice to the veterans and survivors who we serve. I get things done for them.

Mr. Speaker, I would appreciate it if my colleagues across the aisle would stop caring about political wins and focus on getting a win for the most deserving population of veterans and surviving spouses, so let's get the bill paid for and across the finish line.

Mr. Speaker, I find it deeply disingenuous for some of my colleagues to suggest Republicans are willing to pay for war but unwilling to pay for veterans.

As chairman of the House Veterans' Affairs Committee, I am closely aware of the true cost of war. We see it in disability compensation, in survivor benefits, in prosthetics, in mental health care, and in long- term care of catastrophically disabled veterans. Those costs exist because brave men and women answered the Nation's call and came home carrying the physical and invisible wounds of war. The VA budget continues to grow because America continues to honor the promises made for those who serve.

Mr. VAN ORDEN. Mr. Speaker, I am currently working with the appropriators to try to allocate some money for acting lessons for my colleagues so that some of their arguments could be more believable because they simply are not.

Let me explain what the VASP program did. There were unelected bureaucrats under the Biden administration who decided to start buying loans from lending institutions. That is not a VA home loan. It is a VA home loan guarantee. They did this without authorization. They did it contravening the will of Congress to the tune of $6 billion, projected to be $16 to $20 billion.

Here is how incompetent the Veterans Administration was under the previous administration. The VA bought the loans from a lending institution and lowered the interest rate to 2\1/2\ percent. The rest of the American public paid for that because the lending institution was made whole. Then the VA had to contract back with the institutions they just bought the loan from to service the loan because they didn't know how to do it.

That is why that program went away. It would have tanked the entire VA home loan guarantee. We want every Active-Duty servicemember, veteran, and future veterans to have access to that program, and the VASP program would have destroyed it.

I corrected the problem with the partial claim bill. What it did was simply aligned the home loan guarantee program with other Federal home loan guarantees. That was it. It was an elegant solution, and it is done. It will be implemented next month on the 15th.

Yes, there were veterans who lost their homes during this period of time, and that is very, very unfortunate. It truly is. My heart goes out to them, but we must make sure that we understand this program has to go on in perpetuity, and that is what we have done.

Let's talk about what we are actually here for today. There are profoundly handicapped veterans who need 24-hour care. Their caregivers need help, and they need to be able to live in dignity. That is what this bill is doing, and I strongly support Mr. Barrett for doing this. This should have been done years and years ago, but it simply was not.

The offset for this, on average, will cost $8 a month for a second home loan or a refinance. That is less than a cup of coffee at Starbucks. I am absolutely willing to pay that for my fellow veterans, 100 percent, $8 a month increase to refinance or use your veteran home loan guarantee benefit a second time.

There is not a single member of the United States military that is off the coast of Iran that wouldn't willingly pay $8 a month to make sure that our catastrophically handicapped veterans get what they need to live in dignity because that could be them tomorrow.

I find these arguments by my dear colleagues on the other side completely disingenuous. They are bamboozling the American public to think that we do not support our veterans. That is simply wrong. This should be an apolitical--not bipartisan--argument. It should be apolitical. Every single American should support this because fewer than 1 percent of American citizens serve in the military now, and my fellow veterans deserve what we can provide to them so that they can live in dignity.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate earlier in the debate the interest rate reduction and refinancing loans. That was all brought up, and I appreciate my colleague's comments on the interest rate reduction and refinancing loans.

I would also like to make it known that the ranking member is correct that he has not had legislation to increase the rates to the level that this bill is intending to do.

However, during the 116th Congress, the ranking member proposed an amendment to the bill on the floor that would have increased the same refinancing piece we are discussing today. Now, although the rate may not be the same, the concept is the same. I note that the small increase reference piece is the only change that we make after the mark-up version of this bill, which has been done, and that is to cover the cost incurred by expanding the VA home loan program to the National Guard and Reserve, which they wanted, by the way.

The ranking member is making this partisan when it does not need to be.

Instead of focusing on the delivery and an increase to the veterans and surviving spouses, those people who the VA really is focused on taking care of, regardless of who authored the bill, the ranking member has chosen to turn it into a political exercise, and I wonder why.

Earlier in a discussion on the committee's future, the Ranking Member Takano himself stated: We want our gavel back. That is what it is about. The statement speaks for itself.

This bill is not about committee gavels. This is not about partisan advantage. It is about thousands of American families who have waited long enough for the VA benefits to increase.

My fellow GOP colleagues and I are fighting for them, not the gavel. There are 22 veterans service organizations that agree with this.

Mr. Speaker, you have heard from my colleagues on this side of the aisle. Two of them were veterans. I am a veteran.

Why do we agree with it?

It is because we understand.

We also understand the rules of the House. With no disrespect for the ranking member and the other people who spoke, they never raised their hands. We did. We are asking to help those who need the help, and this is the way to do it today.

In the future, if we want to increase it and we want to work towards a larger amount, which I believe they deserve, both of the groups that are mentioned in this, the families who survived and those who have received the most heinous and most difficult wounds that they have to suffer through the rest of their lives, then we will do that, but this is the bill before us today.

I am going to say this, and I will say it to the Members on the other side of the aisle: If you want to go home on Memorial Day weekend and go out there and stand in the parade and tell everybody how great you are for our veterans and vote ``no'' on this, you had better think about it. You had better think about it.

I am going to tell the other side; the veterans and their voices here have spoken. They want this bill.

Mr. Speaker, if they choose to vote ``no,'' then they can answer to those veterans.

I am going to stand for them. I am going to stand for them because I am a grandson of a veteran; a son of a veteran; a nephew of a veteran, who had to have a lot of these services that we deal with in the VA; a son who still serves; a grandson who is going to have to receive some of these benefits; and another grandson who is serving at this time. I don't know what his career is going to be in the field, but it is possible that he could have to have this support too.

Is it personal to me?

You bet it is, Mr. Speaker. This is an important bill. It is important to the families who receive these benefits.

Mr. Speaker, I encourage all of my colleagues to vote for it. I encourage all of my colleagues to vote against the motion to recommit.

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