Congress expands burial honors to pre-1998 veterans and families
H.R. 1344 — Dennis and Lois Krisfalusy Act · Filed by Guy Reschenthaler (R-PA) · 9 cosponsors · Introduced Feb 13, 2025 · Hearing held
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What it does
This bill expands eligibility for VA-provided headstones, markers, and burial receptacles to veterans and certain other individuals who died BEFORE November 11, 1998. Currently, the law limits these benefits to those who died on or after that date; this bill removes that cutoff, allowing families of earlier decedents to receive the same burial honors.
Why we flagged it
The bill's sole operative mechanism is to expand eligibility for VA burial honors by removing a date restriction. It is a straightforward eligibility expansion for a veteran benefit.
What the text implies
- Retroactive eligibility may create administrative burden for VA to process claims for decedents who died decades ago, requiring historical record verification.
- The bill does not specify an effective date or claims deadline, leaving open whether families can claim benefits indefinitely or whether a statute of limitations applies.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
Families of veterans and qualifying individuals who died before 1998 gain access to burial honors previously denied them by an arbitrary date cutoff. This restores dignity and recognition to earlier service members and their families at no cost to other citizens.
Named in the bill
Department of Veterans Affairs, Secretary of Veterans Affairs, 38 U.S.C. § 2306(b)(2)
Where it stands
9 cosponsors: 5 Democrats, 4 Republicans.
- Feb 13, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Feb 13, 2025 — Referred to House Committee on Veterans' Affairs · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs”
- Mar 26, 2025 — Hearing held · Congress.gov: “Subcommittee Hearings Held”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
3 lobbying clients named this bill on 6 disclosure filings across 2 quarters, Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $609,800 in lobbying spend. A filing names 95 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 61% of bills with at least one filing.
Guy Reschenthaler, the sponsor, reported $1,273,000 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- Disabled American Veterans — $310,451 on 2 filings
- Paralyzed Veterans of America — $199,349 on 2 filings
- National Funeral Directors Assn — $100,000 on 2 filings
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 21, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (371 characters) on Sep 28, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 21, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
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