The bill — which passed in the House 402-12 — would ensure the fund can pay benefits for 70 years. It now heads to the Senate, where Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has agreed to call a vote.

“The first responders who rushed into danger on September 11th, 2001 are the very definition of American heroes and patriots,” McConnell said Friday. “The Senate has never forgotten the Victim Compensation Fund and we aren’t about to start now. Nothing about our shared goal to provide for these heroes is remotely partisan. We will consider this important legislation soon.”…

Even the run-up to the vote was marked by tragedy. One 9 /11 first responder — former NYPD bomb-squad detective Luis “Lou” Alvarez – died two weeks after an emotional appearance on Capitol Hill with Stewart. Alvarez was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2016 and underwent 69 rounds of chemotherapy….

The collapse of the World Trade Center in September 2001 sent a cloud of thick dust billowing across Lower Manhattan. Fires burned for weeks. Thousands of construction workers, police officers, firefighters and others spent time working in the soot, often without proper respiratory protection.In the years since, many have seen their health decline, some with respiratory or digestive-system ailments that appeared almost immediately, others with illnesses that developed as they aged, including cancer….