WASHINGTON — Thousands of retired coal miners gathered near the U.S. Capitol in 96-degree weather Thursday to push Congress to save a pension fund many of them depend on that could go broke by year's end.

Lawmakers have not reached a deal to salvage the United Mine Workers of America's Health and Retirement Funds.

About 120,000 retired miners depend on the benefit, which averages $530 a month and keeps them from falling into poverty or onto welfare.

“There's a lot of widows and miners in eastern Kentucky that depend on the UMWA pension for their health care,” said Joseph Hatfield of Pikeville, Ke., the president of the United Mine Workers Union's Local 1511.

Hatfield was one of a group of retired miners who rented a van and drove about eight hours from eastern Kentucky to Washington to participate in the rally. Other miners came in buses from Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Illinois, Ohio and Alabama.

Phil Smith, a union spokesman, said that at least 7,500 attended the rally and about 100 of them got arrested by U.S. Capitol Police when they sat down in a parking lot in protest.

A bipartisan group of senators proposes to rescue the pension fund with unused money from a federal mine reclamation fund, but they remain short of the 60 votes needed to move the bill forward.

The Senate version of the Miners Protection Act has the support of 46 Democrats and eight Republicans, according to its lead sponsor, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-Va.

In May, Manchin sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., asking for a vote on the bill by the end of the summer. The Senate Finance Committee would have to approve the bill before it goes to the full Senate, and then the House of Representatives.

Many of the country's biggest coal producers are in bankruptcy and may be able to shed their pension obligations under restructuring, putting pressure on the 70-year-old fund.

There are only 10,000 active workers to support 120,000 retirees, and 60 percent of the beneficiaries work for coal companies that are no longer in business.