Sponsors (13)
The bill extends and applies retroactively increased DIC to surviving spouses of veterans who die from ALS—providing financial relief to affected families—while increasing VA workload and federal costs that could produce delays or require additional funding.
Surviving spouses of veterans who die from ALS, including cases with short disease duration, become newly eligible for increased Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC).
Eligible survivors of veterans who died of ALS on or after October 1, 2022 can claim retroactive increased DIC payments, allowing recovery of benefits for recent deaths.
Survivors and VA claimants may face delays because retroactive claims will increase VA workload and risk creating or worsening adjudication backlogs.
Taxpayers and veterans may face higher federal spending as DIC outlays rise, which could crowd other VA priorities or require additional appropriations.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Introduced February 26, 2025 by Lisa Murkowski · Last progress February 26, 2025
Amends VA benefits law so that any veteran whom the Department of Veterans Affairs determines died from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is treated as automatically meeting the eligibility condition for increased dependency and indemnity compensation (DIC) for surviving spouses, no matter how long the veteran had ALS before death. The change applies retroactively to veterans who died from ALS on or after October 1, 2022, which may create entitlement to back pay for eligible survivors and require VA administrative updates to process claims.