[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 3665 Enrolled Bill (ENR)]
H.R.3665
One Hundred Seventeenth Congress
of the
United States of America
AT THE SECOND SESSION
Begun and held at the City of Washington on Monday,
the third day of January, two thousand and twenty-two
An Act
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.
Speaker of the House of Representatives.
Vice President of the United States and
President of the Senate.