Saying they saved his and his family members’ lives, President Joe Biden on Monday heaped praise on firefighters and promised to continue pushing for policies to make their jobs safer and care for them if they become injured or sick.

“The overwhelming human instinct is to run away from danger, but when the bell rings, you run toward it, no matter what,” Biden said during a speech at the International Association of Fire Fighters Legislative Conference in Washington.

“And you say you're just doing your job. Well, we know it's not just a job. Being a firefighter is not what you do; it's who you are. … It defines you.”

Biden listed three times firefighters came to the rescue of him and his family. In 1972, firefighters used the jaws of life to extract his sons, Beau and Hunter, from the car accident that killed his first wife, Neilia, and daughter Naomi. In 1988, firefighters transported the then-senator through a snowstorm from Delaware to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, for lifesaving cranial aneurysm surgery. And in 2004, lightning struck Biden’s home, starting a fire.

“My fire company was there to go in and save my wife [Jill], get her out, the cat and my ’67 Corvette,” the president said to laughs.

“In all seriousness, you've been there too many times,” Biden continued. “And people don't really appreciate what you're doing until they need you.”

Biden touted policies his administration has passed that benefit firefighters while vowing to pursue other legislation.

“I promise you,” he said. “You've had my back, and I'll have yours.”

Among the actions he cited were the 2021 American Rescue Plan that helped states and cities keep firefighters on payrolls during the pandemic, legislation making firefighters’ disability retirement benefits tax-free for life, and a law giving gave federal firefighters and their families compensation and other benefits by presuming heart problems, lung disease and cancer were caused by their job.

The president compared such situations to his son Beau’s. Beau Biden was diagnosed with brain cancer after serving in Iraq and died in 2015.

“He was down when from one of those toxic dumps,” the president said. “He came home with Stage 4 glioblastoma, for which there is no cure, and he died. The idea -- and that's why I worked so hard to get that legislation passed for veterans -- that you have to prove beyond a doubt what caused it when it's obvious what was in the air is just wrong.”

In introducing Biden on Monday, Michael Jackson, an Arlington, Virginia, firefighter and president of the Federal Firefighters Joint Council, told the story of how he was diagnosed with cancer in 2021 but amassed more than $100,000 in medical bills because the government denied federal firefighters presumptive coverage for cancer and heart and lung disease.

“This needed to change,” Jackson said. “ … And when President Biden was elected, he finally made the progress we've been waiting for. President Biden has signed law after law to make sure firefighters get the benefits and support they deserve.”

Biden also said the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, passed in 2021, includes funding to make communities more resilient against wildfires, rebuild and reinforce water mains to ensure fire hydrants are working properly and upgrade roads and bridges so emergency responders can reach people in need quickly.

But, Biden said, “there’s so much more we have to do” for firefighters.

He called for more cancer research and said more firefighters are needed in the field. Biden said the Occupational Safety and Health Administration is on track to this fall propose updated emergency preparedness standards, which he said are outdated.

And the president said he supports legislation by Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., and Rep. Bill Pascrell, D-N.J., that would extend public safety officer benefits to include firefighters who die from cancer.