[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 132 (Wednesday, October 9, 2002)]
[House]
[Pages H7305-H7306]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CHILD ABDUCTION PREVENTION
(Mr. LAMPSON asked and was given permission to address the House for
1 minute.)
Mr. LAMPSON. Mr. Speaker, on Monday, the House passed H.R. 5422, the
Child Abduction Prevention Act. As the founder of the Congressional
Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, I would like to thank my
colleagues for coming together to pass this important piece of
legislation.
The provisions of a bill that I introduced, the Secret Service Child
Protection Act, were included in the bill. Many people do not know
this, but the Secret Service does more than protect the President. They
help find missing kids. I wanted to make sure that they are able to
continue assisting investigators, and I worked hard to have the Secret
Service bill included in this overarching bill. The Secret Service is a
key player in the effort to reunite families and to protect children.
The U.S. Secret Service provides resources, expertise, and other
assistance to local law enforcement agencies and to the National Center
for Missing and Exploited Children in cases involving missing and
exploited children. However, even though the partnership is strong,
there was a clear need to provide explicit statutory jurisdiction to
the Secret Service to continue this forensic and investigative support
upon
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request from local law enforcement or the National Center for Missing
and Exploited Children. The bill that we passed on Monday will do just
that.
Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleagues for working together so that we
may hopefully help prevent further abduction and exploitation of
children across America.
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