{"id":355767,"date":"2025-12-18T09:05:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T09:05:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/355767\/"},"modified":"2025-12-18T09:05:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T09:05:10","slug":"senate-passes-honor-act-recognizing-fire-fighter-cancer-as-line-of-duty-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/355767\/","title":{"rendered":"Senate\u00a0passes Honor Act,\u00a0recognizing fire fighter cancer as line-of-duty death"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a\u00a0historic\u00a0development, the\u00a0U.S. Senate\u00a0has passed the IAFF-endorsed Honoring Our Fallen Heroes Act as part of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA),\u00a0advancing a long-fought effort\u00a0by the IAFF\u00a0to secure federal recognition of occupational cancer as a line-of-duty death.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The bill, which has strong bipartisan support in both chambers, now\u00a0goes\u00a0to\u00a0President Donald Trump,\u00a0who will sign it into law\u00a0tomorrow.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u00a0know the devastation occupational cancer has brought to our profession. When a fire fighter dies from job-related cancer, that is a line-of-duty death \u2013 and it is long past time the federal government recognized that truth,\u201d\u00a0said General President Edward Kelly.\u00a0\u201cCongress\u2019s\u00a0passage of the Honor Act marks a\u00a0significant\u00a0turning point. This legislation ensures our fallen are honored,\u00a0and their families are not left behind.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Honor Act, led by Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) and Reps. Carlos Gimenez (R-Fla.) and Mary Gay Scanlon (D-Pa.), updates the federal Public Safety Officers\u2019 Benefits\u00a0(PSOB) program to recognize occupational cancer as a line-of-duty death. The bill extends death and educational benefits to survivors and presumes certain cancers are job-related, removing the requirement to pinpoint a specific exposure.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This was a truly bipartisan effort, and I want to thank those lawmakers on Capitol Hill \u2013 both Republican and Democrat \u2013 who stood with us on this critical legislation. I also want to thank President Trump, whose support\u00a0was crucial in\u00a0passing\u00a0what is easily\u00a0one of the most impactful\u00a0pieces of legislation in\u00a0our union\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

General President Edward Kelly<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was a truly bipartisan effort, and I want to thank those lawmakers on Capitol Hill \u2013 both Republican and Democrat \u2013 who stood with us on this critical legislation,\u201d\u00a0Kelly\u00a0said.\u00a0\u201cI also want to thank President Trump, whose support\u00a0was crucial in\u00a0passing\u00a0what is easily\u00a0one of the most impactful\u00a0pieces of legislation in\u00a0our union\u2019s history.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

For years, the IAFF has led the national fight to recognize occupational cancer as a line-of-duty\u00a0death.\u00a0The union prioritized the\u00a0Honoring Our Fallen Heroes Act\u00a0at the 2025 Alfred K. Whitehead Legislative Conference\u00a0and\u00a0held\u00a0multiple lobbying days with IAFF members and survivors<\/a>\u00a0on Capitol Hill.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe always say the\u00a0IAFF\u2019s\u00a0mission starts in front of a church, and that means taking care of our members and the families\u00a0of our fallen,\u201d\u00a0Kelly said.\u00a0\u201cThat\u2019s\u00a0exactly what this\u00a0PSOB expansion does.\u00a0It puts\u00a0more than\u00a0$461,000 in federal\u00a0death\u00a0benefits in\u00a0the hands of surviving family members.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Honor Act, as part of the NDAA, passed both chambers of Congress with overwhelming bipartisan support \u2013\u00a0receiving 312 votes in the House and 77 in the Senate.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a\u00a0historic\u00a0development, the\u00a0U.S. Senate\u00a0has passed the IAFF-endorsed Honoring Our Fallen Heroes Act as part of the National Defense…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":355768,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-355767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=355767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355767\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/355768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=355767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=355767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=355767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}