Press Releases

Today, U.S. Congressman Paul A. Gosar, D.D.S. (AZ-04) released the following statement honoring January 27, 2015 as the fourth annual National Downwinders Day:  

“Radiation exposure affecting many Arizonans, especially those in Mohave County, continues to not receive the attention that it requires to correct an injustice that was committed by the federal government. The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) has still not been amended to include large parts of Mohave County. This is despite the fact that the National Research Council and the National Academy of Sciences both concluded in separate studies that all of Mohave County should be covered by RECA.

“For Congress to deny the rest of Mohave County, Arizona the right to even file a claim is both inconsistent and careless, and violates both the apology and the promise made to all Downwinders in the original 1990 Act. The original parameters of RECA were created and passed by Congress, so it falls to Congress to remedy this injustice.

“For my part, I will once again be introducing legislation to make sure this entire county is eligible for compensation provided by RECA. My staff and I are in the process of modifying the previous bill to make it more viable. I continue to believe that Mohave County was inexplicably and unjustifiably omitted from the RECA program, and I will continue to work hard on this issue until this error is addressed and rectified.”


Additional:

You can read Congressman Gosar’s recent op-ed on the mistreatment of  Downwinders HERE.

The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act of 1990 established a trust fund to provide compassionate lump-sum payments to individuals—commonly referred to as “Downwinders”—who have contracted certain cancers and other serious diseases that are presumed to be the result of their exposure to ionizing radiation from above-ground nuclear weapons testing or from various activities in connection with uranium mining.  Though the testing in question was performed in Nevada, radioactive elements affected people in Arizona and other parts of the country as well.

The original language in the 1990 RECA used a broad definition of the affected areas in Arizona.  That language read “that part of Arizona that is north of the Grand Canyon and west of the Colorado River”.  That definition therefore included northern Mohave County, Arizona in its definition, as it is the county in Arizona that is closest to Nevada and therefore closest to the testing ranges.

RECA was reauthorized and amended in 2000 for the purposes of expanding eligibility.  With respect to Arizonans’ eligibility, the definition of the affected areas changed to reflect specific counties. Unfortunately, of the five new Arizona counties listed in the 2000 Act, Mohave County was not among them.

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