Families of Fallen US Troops Could See Bigger Payout Under New Bill
Rep. Matt Van Epps (R-TN) announced that four of his amendments were included in the House-passed Fiscal Year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which passed 216-212 on July 21, 2026. The most significant amendment raises the military death gratuity from $100,000 to $165,000 and adds an automatic cost-of-living adjustment, marking the first increase in nearly two decades. This is a scaled-down version of Van Epps' original HONOR Gold Star Families Act, which had proposed $200,000 with retroactive application for Operation Epic Fury. A second amendment addresses aging water and wastewater infrastructure at Fort Campbell and other military installations, directing the Department of War to evaluate and prioritize deferred maintenance projects. The bill now moves to a conference committee with the Senate.
Editorial responsibility
- No named human review is recorded for this page.
- Reports are grouped by semantic similarity and deterministic rules. Language models may assist titles, summaries, translation and cross-source analysis; the page itself is projected from evidence records.
- Current automated evidence projection