Title: To designate the medical center of the Department of Veterans Affairs in San Diego, California, as the Jennifer Moreno Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center, and to support the designation of a component of such medical center in honor of Kathleen Bruyere.
Policy area: Armed Forces and National Security

Summary:
This bill designates the medical center of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in San Diego, California, as the Jennifer Moreno Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center.
The bill also expresses the sense of Congress that the VA should designate a prominent physical space within the Jennifer Moreno Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center to honor Kathleen Mae Bruyere.

[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 3665 Introduced in House (IH)]

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117th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 3665

 To designate the medical center of the Department of Veterans Affairs 
in San Diego, California, as the Jennifer Moreno Department of Veterans 
 Affairs Medical Center, and to support the designation of a component 
          of such medical center in honor of Kathleen Bruyere.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                              June 1, 2021

    Mr. Levin of California (for himself, Mr. Vargas, Ms. Jacobs of 
  California, Mr. Issa, Mr. Peters, and Ms. Brownley) introduced the 
   following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Veterans' 
                                Affairs

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To designate the medical center of the Department of Veterans Affairs 
in San Diego, California, as the Jennifer Moreno Department of Veterans 
 Affairs Medical Center, and to support the designation of a component 
          of such medical center in honor of Kathleen Bruyere.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds the following:
            (1) As of January 2021, of 1,255 health care facilities of 
        the Department of Veterans of Affairs, two are named for women 
        veterans.
            (2) From 2002 through 2006, Jennifer Madai Moreno was an 
        active member of the San Diego High School Junior Reserve 
        Officer Training Corps (JROTC), which is a Department of the 
        Army Honor Unit with Distinction, the highest rating by the 
        Army. She was also chosen to be a member of the San Diego 
        Unified School District Brigade Staff. As a high school senior, 
        she rose quickly to become the top junior marksman in 
        California through the Civilian Marksmanship Program.
            (3) Moreno accepted a JROTC scholarship to the University 
        of San Francisco (USF) for Nursing, becoming the first person 
        in her family to go to college. While at USF, she was chosen 
        for Leadership Development Training. She ultimately achieved 
        the highest level of physical fitness in her ROTC unit.
            (4) Following her graduation from USF with a Bachelor of 
        Science degree in Nursing in 2010, Moreno received her 
        commission in the United States Army as a Second Lieutenant 
        Nurse Corps Officer.
            (5) Upon commissioning, Moreno served as a Gold Bar 
        Recruiter from July 2010 to September 2010.
            (6) Moreno was chosen to attend and completed the Basic 
        Airborne Course in Fort Benning, Georgia and Army Medical 
        Department Officer Basic Course at Ft. Sam Houston, Texas.
            (7) Moreno was then assigned to Madigan Army Medical 
        Center, Joint Base Lewis McCord, Washington in January 2011, 
        where she served as a Clinical Staff Nurse on medical-surgical 
        unit. Moreno earned her certification as a Medical Surgical 
        Registered Nurse in February 2011.
            (8) Moreno volunteered for a position with U.S. Army 
        Special Operations Command in 2011. She was selected into the 
        SOC Cultural Support Team program. She was deployed to 
        Afghanistan in June 2013 with the Army's 75th Ranger Regiment.
            (9) On October 6, 2013, Moreno was attached to a U.S. Army 
        Ranger unit on a night mission in the Zhari district in 
        Kandahar province to capture a high-value target when four 
        explosive devices were triggered.
            (10) During the last moments of Moreno's life, she 
        reportedly heard a call to help a wounded soldier struck by a 
        blast. Moreno did not hesitate to respond to the call for help. 
        As she made her way to help a fallen soldier, she triggered the 
        fifth explosion, which ended her life.
            (11) Moreno was the first Nurse CST member to die in 
        action. Part of her legacy is the number of young women coming 
        from medical fields seeking out voluntary assignments to join 
        the CST program.
            (12) Moreno was the first combat casualty to be buried at 
        Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery in San Diego since the post-9/
        11 conflicts began. She received full military honors.
            (13) After graduating from college in 1966, Kathleen Mae 
        Bruyere was accepted into U.S. Navy Officer Candidate School, 
        after which she was assigned as an on-campus Navy recruiting 
        officer in California.
            (14) Bruyere was named to the staff of Rear Admiral Allen 
        Hill in 1975, becoming the first woman to serve as flag 
        secretary to an admiral.
            (15) In January 1976, Bruyere was chosen as one of 12 Women 
        of the Year on the cover of Time Magazine.
            (16) In 1977, Bruyere joined five other women officers who 
        sued the United States Secretary of the Navy and the United 
        States Secretary of Defense over restrictions that prevented 
        women from serving on combat aircraft and ships. This led to 
        the 1948 Women's Armed Services Integration Act being struck 
        down as unconstitutional, overturning a ban on women serving at 
        sea.
            (17) In 1987, as Special Assistant to the Chief of Naval 
        Operations for women's policy, Bruyere helped conduct an 
        examination of the status of Navy women, including career 
        opportunities and complaints of sexism. The study led to 9,000 
        sea-duty and command jobs opening up for women on 24 combatant 
        ships.
            (18) In 1991, Bruyere was assigned as Commanding Officer 
        for the Navy Recruit Training Command at Orlando, Florida. At 
        the time, it was the Navy's only boot camp that included women. 
        Bruyere oversaw the training of 30,000 enlistees, one third of 
        them women.
            (19) In 1994, Bruyere retired from the Navy as a Captain 
        after 28 years of service.
            (20) From 2012 until shortly before her death in September 
        2020, Bruyere was an active volunteer at Miramar National 
        Cemetery, devoting almost 4,300 hours to helping visitors 
        locate their loved ones' graves and providing information about 
        veterans' burial benefits.
            (21) Bruyere was buried at Miramar National Cemetery with 
        full military honors.
            (22) In May 2021, a panel of San Diego-area members of the 
        Armed Forces, veterans, and military spouses recommended that 
        the San Diego VA Medical Center be renamed in honor of Jennifer 
        Moreno and an internal space be renamed in honor of Kathleen 
        Bruyere.

SEC. 2. DESIGNATION OF JENNIFER MORENO DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS 
              MEDICAL CENTER.

    (a) Designation.--The medical center of the Department of Veterans 
Affairs in San Diego, California, shall after the date of the enactment 
of this Act be known and designated as the Jennifer Moreno Department 
of Veterans Affairs Medical Center.
    (b) Reference.--Any reference in any law, regulation, map, 
document, paper, or other record of the United States to the medical 
center referred to in subsection (a) shall be considered to be a 
reference to the Jennifer Moreno Department of Veterans Affairs Medical 
Center.

SEC. 3. SENSE OF CONGRESS ON DESIGNATION OF MEDICAL CENTER PHYSICAL 
              COMPONENT AFTER KATHLEEN MAE BRUYERE.

    It is the sense of Congress that the Secretary of Veterans Affairs 
should designate a prominent physical space within the Jennifer Moreno 
Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center, as designated pursuant 
to section 2, in honor of Kathleen Mae Bruyere.
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