U.S. ARMY CAPT. LE ROY TORRES (RET.)
Co-Founder & Strategic Advisor · Burn Pits 360, CEO, Torres Consulting
Some people talk about changing the system. Le Roy Torres has the scars and the legislation to prove he did.
A member of the U.S. Army Reserve for 23 years, seven on active duty, sixteen in the Reserve Captain Torres was deployed to Joint Base Balad, Iraq in 2007, where he lived and worked within a mile of one of the largest burn pits in the theater of war: a 10-acre open-air incineration site burning 100 to 200 tons of waste daily, including medical refuse, vehicle parts, munitions, and human waste, around the clock with jet fuel. Within weeks, he began developing respiratory infections and headaches. He would be diagnosed with constrictive bronchiolitis, toxic brain injury, and autoimmune conditions and more than 470 medical visits in a decade.
He returned home to Robstown, Texas with a choice: suffer in silence, or fight back. He chose to fight. In 2010, Le Roy and his wife Rosie co-founded Burn Pits 360 from their kitchen table. A year later, they built what the federal government would not: the first independent burn pit registry, giving veterans and surviving families the evidentiary foundation for a national movement. That registry, and the advocacy built around it, became the engine of one of the most consequential veterans’ policy campaigns in modern American history.
“He doesn’t just understand the system. He reshaped it.”
In January 2013, Torres’ advocacy delivered its first legislative victory when President Barack Obama signed the Airborne Hazards and Open Burn Pit Registry Act into law, the first official federal mandate requiring the VA to systematically document and research burn pit exposure. Torres helped drive that bill as a primary advocate, making repeated trips to Capitol Hill to testify and brief lawmakers alongside fellow veterans.
On August 10, 2022, Torres stood beside President Joe Biden as he signed the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring Our PACT Act into law, the largest expansion of VA healthcare and benefits in the department’s history, now covering more than five million veterans exposed to burn pits, Agent Orange, and other toxic hazards. That moment, photographed on the White House, is one of the defining images of the modern veterans’ advocacy movement.
His personal fight ran on a parallel legal front. After being wrongfully forced out of his 14-year career as a Texas State Trooper due to service-connected injuries, Torres brought a landmark employment rights case through the courts, twice dismissed on sovereign immunity grounds all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In June 2022, the Court ruled 5-4 in his favor in Torres v. Texas Department of Public Safety, a precedent-setting USERRA victory establishing that states can be held accountable for discriminating against returning servicemembers. A unanimous jury subsequently ruled in his favor. Texas has appealed; Torres continues to fight.
In a rare honor, Texas legislation bearing his name, the Captain Le Roy and Rosie Torres Act, now enshrines USERRA employment protections in state law. Burn Pits 360’s megaphone from the Capitol steps now lives in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Latino, accessioned as a gift of Captain Le Roy and Rosie Torres, a recognition that their story is not only veterans’ history, but American history.
Today, as Co-Founder and Strategic Advisor of Torres Consulting, Le Roy brings lived authority, legislative impact, and moral clarity to every engagement, advising nonprofits, government agencies, corporations, and advocacy organizations on policy, public health, and systemic reform affecting veterans, first responders, and underserved communities.
AWARDS & RECOGNITION
· Presidential Medal of Freedom — Recommended (3×) Reps. Castro, Herrero & Sen. Gillibrand
· Smithsonian National Museum of the American Latino — Permanent Collection 2026
· State of the Union Guest — Rep. Joaquín Castro 2022
· U.S. Supreme Court Victory — Torres v. Texas Dept. of Public Safety 2022
· Featured — “The Problem with Jon Stewart,” Apple TV+ 2021–2023
· Harvard Law Review — Torres v. Texas (case featured)
· Find Your Fight Book by Jay Ruderman (featured)
· Army Outstanding Volunteer Service Medal (2008)
· Knights of Colombus
· National Veterans Legal Services Program
· Senator Daniel Inouye Award (2022) – Quincy Institute-Award for Responsible Statecraft (2022)
· American Thoracic Society Presidential Commendation (2023)
· Caller Times Newsmakers of the Year (2023)
· Robstown ISD Education Foundation Excellence in Leadership Award (2024) · LULAC Presidential Commendation Award (2024)
· American GI Forum Community Advocates Award (2024)
· Latino Magazine Estrella Award Honoring Latino Veterans (2025)
· Silver Patrick Henry Medal 2026
· Community Outstanding Award (2018 · United Chamber of Commerce-Corpus Christi Best in the Biz (2018) Military Veteran Entrepreneurship Award
· Reserve Organization of America-Twice the Citizen Award (2022)
LEGISLATIVE MILESTONES
· Airborne Hazards & Open Burn Pit Registry Act — signed by President Obama Jan. 2013
· PACT Act — signed by President Biden Aug. 2022
· Torres v. Texas (USERRA) — U.S. Supreme Court ruling June 2022
· Captain Le Roy & Rosie Torres Act (Texas) 2023
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
· Veteran toxic exposure advocacy
· Legislative strategy & coalition-building
· USERRA & veterans’ employment rights
· Congressional testimony & briefings – Public policy reform
· Nonprofit leadership
· Community reintegration & peer support
NATIONAL MEDIA COVERAGE
· The New York Times
· The Hollywood Reporter CNN
· NPR
· NBC News PBS NewsHour
· CBS Washington Post
· Bloomberg Apple TV+
· Univision Military Times
· Stars and Stripes Texas Tribune
· KFF Health News Politico
· The Hill Spectrum News
