[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 164 (Tuesday, September 22, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Page S5775]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             SAVANNA'S ACT

  Ms. CANTWELL. Madam President, before I do, I wanted to say just a 
word about Savanna's Act, which, I can tell you, Justice Ginsburg would 
probably be happy that the House has now passed and, previously, the 
Senate had passed Savanna's Act, legislation that would help protect 
the rights and help move forward on changes to law enforcement that 
would better protect missing and murdered indigenous women.
  This legislation--originally sponsored by my colleagues Heidi 
Heitkamp and Lisa Murkowski, and most recently cosponsored by Senator 
Murkowski, Senator Cortez Masto, and myself--I believe is on its way to 
the President's desk, and I am hoping that the President will sign this 
important legislation as soon as possible.
  Indigenous women deserve to have the same rights and same protections 
under the law, but they need to have people who are tracking these 
heinous crimes that are happening because they are the victims of these 
crimes at a much higher rate than the general population.
  You ask yourself: Well, how can that be? When you think about these 
women being abducted and murdered and missing, you have to have law 
enforcement who are going to follow these cases, track individuals, 
track the court process, and this is what better protocols, better 
statistics, and a better system is going to do with the passage of 
Savanna's Act. It will give us those tools that we need for indigenous 
women.
  So I thank all of my colleagues for helping with the passage of that 
important legislation. It is on its way to the President's desk, and, 
again, I hope he will sign it as soon as possible.

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