[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 82 (Monday, June 4, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3678-S3679]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN REAUTHORIZATION ACT OF 2012
Mr. LEAHY. Madam President, it has been more than a month since the
Senate came together to pass the Violence Against Women Reauthorization
Act of 2012. This bill, commonly referred to as VAWA, reflects the
tradition of bringing together people from both political parties to
work with professionals in the field and address the needs of victims--
all victims. More than two-thirds of the Senate, including 15
Republicans, voted for this common sense legislation. It is a rare feat
in the Senate these days, as the distinguished Presiding Officer knows,
but it demonstrates that the Leahy-Crapo reauthorization bill is about
saving lives, not partisan politics.
Few laws have had a greater impact on the lives of women in this
country than the Violence Against Women Act. Because of this law, the
days of dismissing domestic and sexual violence crimes with a joke or a
shrug are over. The resources, training, and law enforcement tools
provided by VAWA over the past 18 years have transformed the criminal
justice and community-based responses to abuse. It gave support and
protection to victims who for generations had been blamed, humiliated,
and ignored.
I had hoped the House Republicans would follow our demonstration of
bipartisanship by moving forward with the Senate-passed VAWA
reauthorization bill. Instead, the Republican leadership in the House
chose to proceed with a bill that doesn't reflect the core values of
VAWA.
I mention its core values because we worked--both parties in this
body--to reflect what is most important in VAWA. The House Republican
bill does not include protections for all victims. It takes away
existing protections that have proven effective in preventing domestic
and sexual violence. In short, the House bill is not VAWA.
Regrettably, the House Republican leadership would not even allow a
vote on the bipartisan Senate-passed bill, which truly does do the job.
They would not allow open debate regarding the relative merits of the
different versions of the bill--ours, which protects all victims, and
theirs, which rolls back protections. Had the House had the opportunity
to vote on the Senate-passed bipartisan bill, I believe the President
would have signed it and it would now be law. Nearly two dozen House
Republicans, along with most Democratic Members, voted against the
restrictive House bill.
It is not surprising that the House Republican bill failed to gain
support among those who actually work with victims, the people who see
these victims on a daily basis in all parts of the country. When
challenged on the House floor to name any law enforcement or victim
advocacy organization that supported the House Republican bill, their
lead sponsor could not name a single one. Why? More than 320
organizations that work with the victims of domestic and sexual
violence opposed that bill.
By contrast more than 1,000 local, State, and national organizations
supported the bipartisan Senate bill, including hundreds of law
enforcement, victim advocates, and faith-based groups. Why? Because in
our bill, we worked at it. We did it the old-fashioned way--Republicans
and Democrats working together after months of discussion with
stakeholders from across the country and all political persuasions from
the right to the left. The provisions in our bill that protect battered
immigrant women, Native women, and the most vulnerable among us who
have had trouble accessing services were recommendations from those
very professionals who work with crime victims every day. The
bipartisan Senate bill is intended to respond to the changing, unmet
needs of victims and to prevent future acts of domestic and sexual
violence. Instead of picking and choosing, as they tried to, among who
would get protection, we came up with a simple fact. We said a victim
is a victim is a victim. If somebody has been victimized, the police
don't go and say: Can we help this battered person, maybe even murdered
person? We might be able to get involved in this, provided they are not
an immigrant or provided they are not a Native American or provided
only if they are straight. That is not the way it works.
I still have nightmares over some of the crime scenes I visited at 2
and 3 and 4 o'clock in the morning when I was a prosecutor and I saw
people who had been badly battered, badly injured. I never heard a
police officer say: Before we go any further on this, what category
does this battered victim fall into? Because unless they fall into one
of these specific categories--such as the House bill had--we can't do
anything for them. No, no police officer ever said that in my presence
nor in anybody else's presence.
It was law enforcement who educated us on the importance of the U
visa to keeping our streets safe and encouraged us to support a modest
improvement to this program. The enhanced consultation provisions in
the bill were included after domestic and sexual assault coalitions and
other victim advocacy groups told us that they wanted to coordinate
their activities in a more effective way with VAWA state administrators
and Federal agencies. Victim service providers also told us that the
LGBT community experiences violence at the same rate as the broader
community but faces a serious lack of available services. It was the
Native American community that informed us about the epidemic of
domestic violence in tribal communities and the need to increase local
prosecution of these crimes. It is unacceptable that nearly three out
of five Native American women have been assaulted by their spouses or
intimate partners, yet the percentage of these cases that are
prosecuted is appallingly low. That is why our bill provides law
enforcement with additional tools to combat domestic and sexual
violence in Tribal communities.
The Senate has already considered and soundly defeated a conscripted
version of the bill, like the House Republicans' version, that would
not help all victims. We voted 37 62 against the Hutchison-Grassley
amendment last April. This was not a case where an amendment did not
obtain a supermajority of more than 60 votes. The votes against it were
bipartisan and more than 60. I do not understand why the House
Republican leadership has gone to tremendous lengths to avoid debating
and voting on the bipartisan Senate-passed VAWA reauthorization bill.
The House Republican leadership has refused to consider two House
bills that mirror the Leahy-Crapo bill, including one introduced by a
Republican. They also raised a procedural technicality as an excuse to
avoid debating the Senate bill, even though the Speaker of the House
has the ability to waive that technicality and allow the House to move
forward to consider the bipartisan Senate bill.
The Majority Leader tried to move this forward 2 weeks ago by
proposing a way to resolve the technical objection by House Republicans
to considering the bipartisan Senate-passed bill, but the Republican
leader objected.
Frankly, victims should not be forced to wait any longer. They will
not benefit from the improvements made by the bipartisan Leahy-Crapo
bill, unless both Houses of Congress vote to pass this legislation. The
problems and barriers facing victims of domestic and
[[Page S3679]]
sexual violence are too serious for Congress to delay. Domestic and
sexual violence knows no political party. Its victims are Republican
and Democrat, rich and poor, young and old. Helping these victims, all
of them, should be our goal.
I will continue to work with our leadership in the Senate to come up
with a solution that can move us past this impasse and send back to the
House a Violence Against Women Act reauthorization bill that protects
all victims. We know we can do that because the Senate has already
passed such a bill. I am still hopeful that the House will do the same.
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