Military widows’ future stuck in partisan brawl over veteran benefits

Military widows’ future stuck in partisan brawl over veteran benefits The fight has little to do with grieving spouses, but they’re caught in the middle of a bigger battle over how veterans should get compensated for their service. 08/31/2026 04:45 AM EDT A House brawl over veteran benefits could ruin the last, best chance for military widows to fix a decades-old law that penalizes them for falling in love again. The fight has little to do with grieving spouses, who want to overturn a 70-year-old rule that strips away support benefits when they remarry. But they’re caught in the middle of a much bigger battle over how veterans should get compensated for their service. Republicans have proposed funding this and other benefits by pulling money from future disability payments for veterans with sleep apnea and hearing issues. Democrats argue that sets a dangerous precedent and betrays promises to take care of wounded troops. The standoff comes as U.S. troop casualties in the Iran war mount and Republicans wrestle with the Trump administration’s plans for a record-breaking defense budget — none of which is slated for a military widows fix. And with lawmakers unable to resolve their fight over paying for new veterans’ benefits, it’s increasingly likely Congress will once again fail to fix the problem. “It’s really difficult that this country makes widows have to calculate financial consequences before they’re allowed to love somebody again,” said Kaanan Mackey-Fugler, whose first husband, Iowa National Guard Staff Sgt. Matthew Mackey, died in a 2010 accident just weeks after returning from an active-duty deployment to Iraq. The mother of five didn’t plan to remarry. But seven years later, she fell in love and decided she needed to move on with her life. It cost her tens of thousands of dollars. “It has gotten to the point where my new husband and I have had conversations about whether to get divorced, just to get those benefits back,” she said. When a servicemember dies, their spouse receives monthly payments from the military and Department of Veterans Affairs, totaling around $1,700. But when Congress originally approved the program in the 1950s, lawmakers included a provision that the government would discontinue checks if that spouse gets remarried before 55. Advocates note that many states had rules at the time about women opening their own bank accounts and holding credit cards. Today, nearly half of military families are dual income households. Congress “has an opportunity to end the unfair penalties placed on surviving families,” said Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kansas), sponsor of two bills that would fix the remarriage issue. “Military service is a family service.” A group of 179 House lawmakers and 60 senators — including 41 chamber Democrats — have signed onto Moran’s stand-alone legislation dubbed the Love Lives On Act to address the remarriage problem. But similar efforts over the last decade have faced the same congressional obstacle: cost. VA estimates have put the expense of addressing the issue at up to $4 billion over the next decade. And appropriators have jousted over whether VA or Defense Department funds should cover the bill. Moran, the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee chair, and House Veterans’ Affairs Chair Mike Bost (R-Ill.) proposed a solution this year in the Take Care of America’s Veterans Act. It uses $57 billion in projected savings to erase the remarriage penalty and pay for a host of other new veterans payouts. But the source of those savings is a years-old proposal to limit money awarded for new veterans’ disability claims related to tinnitus and sleep apnea. Groups like the Veterans of Foreign Wars and Disabled American Veterans have decried that move as stealing from one group of military beneficiaries to boost others’ wallets. Other groups — like the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors — note that Veterans Affairs is set to make the disability changes regardless of the fate of the sweeping veterans benefits bill. “Every Congress we get very close on this,” said Ashlynne Haycock-Lohmann, director of government and legislative affairs for the nonprofit. “This is the closest and best chance we’ve ever had to really get this done. And it’s definitely our only chance in this Congress.” Democratic leaders have strongly supported passing the Love Lives On Act on its own, but not as part of the Take Care of America’s Veterans Act. They have also questioned whether the VA disability changes should or will go through. Critics of the bigger bill say it is misguided, preferring to keep trying to pass the benefits expansions as individual bills. Republicans appeared poised to pass the measure until July, when a handful of GOP House members raised concerns highlighted by the critics. Speaker Mike Johnson blamed “misinformation” on the defections and said leaders would work with bill sponsors to win over the needed votes this fall. House lawmakers are eyeing mid-September for another vote, one they hope will have enough GOP backing to advance the issue. Bost called it “the No. 1 priority” for his committee and most veterans advocates. He also said the measure will “do good for every corner of the veteran community by addressing the issues we have been working on for years,” like the remarriage penalty. If the House can pass the measure in the next few weeks, Senate Republican leaders have promised to fast-track the legislation in an effort to send it to the president’s desk by the end of the year. If House lawmakers can’t, the measure will likely be shelved until the next Congress. Spouses like Loretta Booker are hoping for a positive outcome. She lost her husband, Petty Officer 1st Class Corwyn A. Booker Jr., to a sudden illness in 2019. She never thought she would remarry, but she became engaged in January. Now she’s trying to figure out how long she can wait to get married. If she holds out five more years, she’ll turn 55 and avoid the financial penalties. But her son will also be 18 by then, and her new husband won’t have the same opportunity to adopt him. “I’m not getting a replacement husband,” she said. “I will always be my late husband’s widow. But I also know he would want me to move on, … and you shouldn’t have to choose between moving on and financial security.”