Nuclear radiation compensation advocates call on western Republicans to ask Johnson for vote

Advocates for an expired radiation compensation bill pressed a group of western Republican House members, many of them facing tough re-elections, to support a reauthorized, expanded version of the bill in a letter Thursday.

The letter, shared with The Hill, calls on recipients to ask Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) for a vote on a bill to expand and reauthorize the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA), which expired earlier this summer.

The letter is addressed to Reps. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), Juan Ciscomani (R-Az.), Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.), Ryan Zinke (R-Mt.), Monica De La Cruz (R-Tx.), David Schweikert (R-Az.) and Eli Crane (R-Az.). Chavez-DeRemer, Ciscomani and Schweikert all represent districts that voted for President Biden in 2020.

The RECA expansion bill passed the Senate by a two-to-one margin in March, but Johnson has yet to bring it to the floor, with his office telling The Hill earlier this year that the speaker has reservations about the price tag and whether the bill, which passed with a minority of the Senate Republican caucus voting for it, has the votes in the GOP-controlled chamber.

The letter specifically invokes RECA’s relevance to the western and southwestern U.S., where the federal government conducted the Manhattan Project during World War 2. The original RECA law does not cover those downwind of the 1945 Trinity atomic bomb test, while the Senate bill would add them to its beneficiaries as well as affected areas in Missouri, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico and Guam.

Signers of the letter include the Navajo Nation, the National Association of Atomic Veterans, Idaho Downwinders, Just Moms STL and National Nuclear Workers for Justice.

“We are dying. It is vital that this life-saving program is revived and improved for those of us who were unwittingly injured by government negligence. It is the right thing to do,” the letter states.

The Hill has reached out to the members for comment.