The United States Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) is a federal statute implemented in 1990, set to expire in July 2024, providing for the monetary compensation of people, including atomic veterans, who contracted cancer and a number of other specified diseases as a direct result of their exposure to atmospheric nuclear testing undertaken by the United States during the Cold War as residents, or their exposure to radon gas and other radioactive isotopes while undertaking uranium mining, milling or the transportation of ore.

In its fifth draft, a Bill entitled Radiation Exposure Compensation Act of 1979 was sponsored by Senator Ted Kennedy[1] of Massachusetts.

The Bill intended to make compensation available to persons exposed to fallout from nuclear weapons testing and for living uranium miners (or their survivors) who had worked in Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona between 1 January 1947 and 31 December 1961.

Fallout areas listed by the bill included counties in Utah and Nevada: Utah counties included Millard, Sevier, Beaver, Iron, Washington, Kane, Garfiend, Piute, Wayne, San Juan, Grand, Carbon, Emery, Duchesne, Uintah, San Pete and Juab.

[4] Because many uranium miners were Native Americans, they did not have standard marriage licenses required to establish a legal connection to the deceased.

3783 was introduced to extend RECA to 2045, expand downwinder eligibility to include Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Guam, and Colorado, to expand uranium worker eligibility to those who worked after 1971, until 1990, also covering people involved in the cleanup of Enewetak Atoll of the Marshall Islands from 1977-1981, increase the compensation to $150,000 for all claimants, and to allow people exposed to atmospheric testing to receive the same medical benefits as Department of Energy workers, eligible under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program.

[11] For many years Senator Ben Ray Luján and other members of Congress have attempted to get compensation for those affected by the Trinity test.

[12] After the film Oppenheimer brought renewed attention to the test, the United States Senate approved the New Mexico downwinders' inclusion in the RECA amendment.