Congressional Daily Briefing
By: Luisa Groher
Tags: House Of Representatives, Veterans, Politics, Senate, Opioids

Building Blocks of STEM Act [Passed House]

The House of Representatives passed the Building Blocks of STEM Act (H.R. 1665), a bill led by Representative Haley Stevens, the Chairwoman of the House Science Subcommittee on Research and Technology. The Building Blocks of STEM Act was introduced jointly by Representative Stevens and Representative Jim Baird in the House of Representatives, alongside Senators Jacky Rosen and Shelley Moore Capito in the Senate.

If passed, the bill would direct public resources to study opportunities for early childhood STEM education and strategies to encourage girls to engage in STEM & computer science. The bill would increase federal support for research and programming that engages girls in STEM, the Building Blocks of STEM Act brings us closer to realizing the benefits of a more diverse and representative STEM workforce that can advance our country’s technological, economic, and security interests.



Expanding Findings for Federal Opioid Research and Treatment (EFFORT) Act [Passed House]

The House of Representatives passed Congresswoman Jennifer Wexton’s Expanding Findings for Federal Opioid Research and Treatment (EFFORT) Act, which directs the National Science Foundation (NSF) to support research on opioid addiction. The bill is designed to will help to decrease preventable deaths caused by opioid overdoses and will drive better treatment approaches by directing the NSF to expand research focused on opioid addiction, allowing for further understanding of how to more effectively treat the many aspects of opioid addiction.

The American Manufacturing Leadership Act (H.R. 2397) [Passed House]

The House of Representatives passed legislation by Congresswoman Haley Stevens to strengthen our nation’s largest investment in advanced manufacturing — the Manufacturing USA Program.

The bill will reauthorize and improve the Revitalize American Manufacturing and Innovation (RAMI) Act by increasing funding for the program, strengthening the institutes’ role in advanced manufacturing workforce development, and facilitating regional supply chain development.

Ryan Kules Specially Adaptive Housing Improvement Act of 2019 [Passed House]



The House of Representatives passed a bill introduced by U.S. Representatives Mike Levin and Gus Bilirakis (R-FL) that would improve the Veterans Benefits Administration’s Specially Adapted Housing (SAH) program. This program provides grants to veterans and servicemembers with service-connected disabilities to assist them in constructing, purchasing, or remodeling homes to fit their needs.

Helping Expand and Launch Transitional Health (HEALTH) (H.R. 2942) [Passed House]



The HEALTH bill, authored by Representative Cisneros, helps female veterans receive healthcare. Because servicewomen face unique healthcare challenges, the legislation would help educate women about health care that is available to them at the VA while they transition into civilian life.

Palestinian International Terrorism Support Prevention Act [Passed House]

The House of Representatives passed a bill, sponsored by Congressmen Brian Mast, that imposes sanctions on foreign persons, agencies and governments that assist Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad or their affiliates. Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad are foreign terrorist organizations and specially designated by the United States government as global terrorists. The bill would require the president to supply an annual report to Congress identifyingforeign persons, agencies or instrumentalities of a foreign state who knowingly and materially assist Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, or an affiliate or successor of one of those organizations.

LEGION Act [Passed House]

The House of Representatives passed LEGION Act — a Senate bill sponsored by Arizona senior Senator Kyrsten Sinema. The legislation extends American Legion membership to honorably discharged veterans since World War II.



Honoring American Veterans in Extreme Need (HAVEN) Act (H.R. 2938) [Passed House]

The HAVEN Act amends current bankruptcy law to better protect the economic security of veterans and their families. The legislation — sponsored by Representative Lucy McBath — aims to remove this unequal treatment of disability payments made to veterans or their dependents and would to amend bankruptcy law to treat Department of Veterans Affairs and Department of Defense veteran’s disability payments the same as Social Security disability benefits, which are exempt from bankruptcy means-testing.