Congress expands military survivor benefits, raises payments for widows and dependents
H.R. 2055 — Caring for Survivors Act of 2025 · Filed by Jahana Hayes (D-CT) · 134 cosponsors · Introduced Mar 11, 2025 · Hearing held
Your members of Congress
Enter a ZIP to see where your representative and both senators stood on this bill.
Looked up on this device — your ZIP is never stored on our servers.
What it does
This bill increases dependency and indemnity compensation (DIC) paid to surviving spouses of deceased veterans by tying the payment to 55% of the rate for totally disabled veterans (Section 1114(j)), replacing a fixed dollar amount. It also expands eligibility for DIC to survivors of veterans who were rated totally disabled for at least 5 years before death (down from 10 years), with a pro-rata reduction for those with less than 10 years of continuous disability rating.
Why we flagged it
The bill's sole operative purpose is to increase and broaden dependency and indemnity compensation for military survivors. It is a straightforward entitlement expansion with no riders, tax provisions, or regulatory changes.
What the text implies
- Tying DIC to Section 1114(j) rate (totally disabled veteran compensation) creates an automatic indexing mechanism—future increases to that rate will automatically raise survivor payments without requiring new legislation.
- Pro-rata reduction for survivors with 5–9 years of continuous disability rating (rather than full payment) may create administrative complexity in calculating individual benefit amounts.
- Retroactive application to pre-1993 veteran deaths (via the 'special rule') ensures older survivors receive the higher of the old or new formula, protecting those already receiving benefits.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
Military survivors—spouses and dependents of deceased veterans—receive higher monthly payments and broader eligibility. The bill expands the pool of qualifying survivors and ties payments to a higher indexed rate, ensuring benefits keep pace with disability compensation adjustments rather than remaining fixed.
Who stands to gain
- surviving spouses of deceased veterans
- dependents of deceased veterans
Named in the bill
Department of Veterans Affairs, 38 U.S.C. § 1311 (dependency and indemnity compensation for surviving spouses), 38 U.S.C. § 1318 (DIC for survivors of totally disabled veterans), 38 U.S.C. § 1114(j) (monthly compensation for totally disabled veterans)
Where it stands
134 cosponsors: 130 Democrats, 4 Republicans.
- Mar 11, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Mar 11, 2025 — Referred to House Committee on Veterans' Affairs · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs”
- Jun 24, 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 4 disclosure filings across 2 quarters, Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $1,194,838 in lobbying spend. A filing names 110 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.
Jahana Hayes, the sponsor, reported $630,811 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- Military Officers Association of America — $854,387 on 1 filing
- Disabled American Veterans — $310,451 on 2 filings
- The Als Association — $30,000 on 1 filing
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 (2,529 characters) on Sep 21, 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.
“Congress expands military survivor benefits, raises payments for widows and dependents” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/hr2055 Report an error
The week in bills
One email, Sunday: what Congress passed, what it changed, and who paid.
One link arrives to confirm the address. It is used for this email and nothing else, and every issue carries an unsubscribe link.