The Violence Against Women Act was signed less than one year ago and passed with strong bipartisan support (the House vote was 411-0). Many Republicans claimed, with its passage, that they would fully support and fund Violence Against Women programs. Contrary to this claim, the FY1996 appropriations for Violence Against Women Act programs are in jeopardy.
Nearly all of the Violence Against Women Act programs are funded through the Violent Crime Trust Fund. The House/Senate Budget Resolution called for the Violent Crime Trust Fund to by cut by $200 million in 1996; yet over three-fourths ($161 million) of those cuts are being absorbed by Violence Against Women Act programs.
On Wednesday, June 28th, the House Commerce, Justice, State and Judiciary Appropriations Subcommittee removed $100 million of money allocated for Violence Against Women Act programs. Violence Against Women Act programs were authorized to receive $175 million from this subcommittee in FY1996; the subcommittee allocated only $75 million. Programs covered by this committee include training for law enforcement and judiciary officials on violence issues, programs for victims of child abuse, judicial training on child abuse, and programs to address stalking and campus sexual assault.
On July 11, the Labor/HHS/Education subcommittee reduced the Violence Against Women Act money from $62 million down to $400,000. This recommendation effectively disables the ability of the Violence Against Women Act to protect poor and abused women. Funding will not be available for several key VAWA programs, including battered women's shelters; rape education and prevention grants to schools; rape crisis centers; and a study on campus sexual assault. Only the national hotline for women who are the targets of violence received funding (the $400,000), but services to help those women are nearly gutted.
ACTION NEEDED:
Please contact the members of the full Appropriations Committee (if your member is on that committee) and urge them to not cut the funding for the Violence Against Women Act and keep it fully funded. Remind them that this act passed just a year ago with bipartisan support.
The Ethics Committee has the authority to call for public hearings on its own, as it did in its investigation of the "Keating Five" in the early 90's. It should not be up to the accused to decide how charges against him are heard. The Packwood women want public hearings and their day in "court"; they deserve nothing less.
ACTION NEEDED : This is the same message we've been directing to the Senate Ethics Committee since the beginning: hold public hearings. Members of the Ethics Committee are: Mitch McConnell, R-KY, Chair; Robert Smith, R-NH; Larry Craig, R-ID; Richard Bryan, D-NV, Vice Chair; Barbara Mikulski, D-MD; Byron Dorgan, D-ND.
Both of these bills eliminate the AFDC program and several related welfare programs and substitute a block grant to the states to run their own welfare programs, with varying requirements on the states for the use of the money. Individual entitlement to welfare and related programs will be eliminated; states will have wide discretion to run their own eligibility program, setting the stage for 50 different experiments in welfare reform. Funding for these block grants is capped at FY 94 levels for 5 years, with little flexibility for local changes in need or an increase in local unemployment rates. While the House bill attempts to change a wide variety of welfare programs, the Senate bill has separated out many of these programs to various committees; the Senate's final floor bill will be a combination of bills like the House version (AFDC, other welfare and day care, food stamps and nutrition programs, etc.). We are repeating the table from the last Update comparing the House and Senate bills.
House: Personal Responsibility Act of 1995 Senate: Family Self Sufficiency Act of 1995
House: AFDC replaced with the Temporary Family Assistance Block Grant. Senate: AFDC replaced with the Temporary Family Assistance Block Grant.
House: FUNDING: *Federal share is frozen for 5 years at the FY 94 spending levels. *"Rainy Day" emergency loans of $1 billion can be granted; they must be paid back in 3 years with interest, and are granted only if state unemployment is above 6.5% and exceeds the unemployment level of one of the past two years by 10%. Senate: FUNDING: *Federal share is frozen for 5 years at the FY 94 spending levels. *"Rainy Day" emergency loans are granted, but they may not exceed 10% of the FY grant to the state and must be paid back in 3 years, with interest.
House: WORK REQUIREMENTS: (% of recipients who must participate in a work activity in order for the state to be in compliance with the program.) *Requirements are 10% participation in FY 96, increasing to 50% in FY 2003. *Education can be considered work, but it must be combined with at least 20 hours of work activity per week by an individual under the age of 20. *Requirements for two parent families would be increased by 50% in FY 96 and 90% in FY 98. *Work activities are defined as: unsubsidized employment; subsidized private and public sector employment; public work experience, including refurbishing public housing; job training; job searches; education related to employment; education related to getting GED if the recipient is under 20 and not yet received a high school diploma; secondary education. Note: No new funding to meet these increases in work requirements, including child care. This applies to the Senate bill as well. Senate: WORK REQUIREMENTS: (% of recipients who must participate in a work activity in order for the state to be in compliance with the program.) *After two years (earlier at state option) of assistance, adults must participate in work activities. There is some elaboration of work requirements in the Senate bill, although it is not as detailed as the House bill. *By FY 96 20% of recipients must participate in work activities, by FY 2001 50% must participate in work activities. *The individual participant must engage in at least 20 hours of work activities per week, otherwise assistance will be reduced by 20%. *By FY 60% of recipients who are two parent families must participate in some work activity, and by FY 99 90% of recipients in two parent families must participate. *At least one parent must participate in work activities for at least 30 hours per week, otherwise assistance will be reduced by an unspecified amount. *There is not a separate detailed definition of work activities in the Senate bill. Work activities are modeled on the current JOBS program. Note: The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) presented testimony at the Finance Committee mark-up that to meet work requirements, States would have to spend up to 60-70% of their block grant money on child care and training. It was their belief that States would instead take the 25% penalty from the block grant, the maximum amount imposed if a state does not comply with the work requirements.
House: INDIVIDUAL EXCLUSIONS:
*No cash assistance will be granted to:
*A child born out of wedlock to a mother under the age of 18, except if the
child is a result of rape or incest.
*A child born to a current welfare recipient (i.e., while a brother or sister
is receving benefits), except if the child is a result of rape or incest.
*If paternity is not established by the mother of a child who is receiving welfare
benefits, then there is a reduction of $50 per child or 15% of the family grant until
paternity is established.
Senate: INDIVIDUAL EXCLUSIONS:
*There are no exclusions listed for children born out of wedlock or while the parents
are receiving welfare; however, some Senators have threatened to reintroduce this on
the floor.
*All recipients must establish paternity. If paternity is not established for 100%
of the recipients in the state, then the state may be penalized up to 5% of its block
grant until the compliance rates are met.
House: LEGAL IMMIGRANTS: *No cash assistance is given to resident aliens, except if they are refugees, legal immigrants over 75 living in the US for at least 5 years, veterans honorably discharged, or disabled permanent residents. Senate: LEGAL IMMIGRANTS: *Similar restrictions on receipt of benefits to resident aliens.
House: TIME LIMITS: *60 month (5 years) lifetime mandatory cap. There is a hardship exception for 10% of the caseload. Senate: TIME LIMITS: *60 month lifetime mandatory cap (earlier at the state option). There is a 15% hardship exception.
House: CHILD CARE: *Eliminates child care guarantee. *Creates transitional child care (i.e. no longer an entitlement). Previously child care was provided to working mothers with children under the age of 6. Senate: CHILD CARE: *Child Care programs are collapsed into one discretionary block grant, the Child Care Development Block Grant. *Entitlement to child care is eliminated except for one condition. Work activity participants must be provided with child care by the state if they have a child under the age of 6.
House: CHILD WELFARE: *The Child Care Block Grant will replace 23 federal programs covering foster care, adoption assistance, and child abuse prevention and treatment. The block grant will be capped at 1994 spending levels. Senate: CHILD WELFARE: *Child welfare programs will remain unchanged from current law in the Senate. This means the entitlement to child welfare programs is preserved in the Senate bill (thus far).
House: ILLEGITIMACY RATIO: (Calculated by adding out of wedlock births and the increase in the number of abortions and dividing that by the number of total births in the state.) *A 5% bonus is awarded to states that reduce out of wedlock births by 1%. A 10% bonus is awarded to states for a reduction by 2%. *One way that a state could conceivably improve their illegitimacy ratio is to decrease the number of abortions that are performed in the state, by making them more difficult to obtain. The state would then be eligible for an increase in funds, without addressing the issue of teenage pregnancy. Senate: ILLEGITIMACY RATIO: *Not in the version of the bill reported out of the Finance Committee. The general language of reducing the number of illegitimate births, however, is in the bill. *Some Senators have mentioned that they will introduce this as an amendment once the bill is introduced on the floor.
House: MEDICAL: *No funds can be utilized from the block grant to provide medical services. A debate between Rep. Hyde (R-IL) and Rep. Greenwood (R-PA) made clear that this amendment, which was introduced by Rep. Hyde, applies only to abortion services. *The current medical assistance and Medicaid programs will remain federal programs and will be handled at a later date by Congress. It is uncertain what the coverage will be and specifically whether children and families, who are cut off of welfare will continue to receive these benefits. Senate: MEDICAL: *No funds can be utilized from the block grant for medical services. It is uncertain at this point whether this includes family planning and abortion services. (The Finance Committee staff has indicated that this ban is not intended to include family planning and abortion services, although we suspect both will be affected.) *The current medical assistance and Medicaid programs will remain federal programs and will be handled by Congress at a later date.
House: CHILD SUPPORT: *After paternity is established, the state will set up a program, probably using existing databases, to collect child support. Senate: CHILD SUPPORT: *After paternity is established, the state will set up a program, probably using existing data bases, to collect child support. *The drivers licenses of delinquent supporters can be revoked.
House: FOOD STAMPS: *There is an allocation cap to the individual states, which ignores demand. This cap is based upon the previous spending of the state. *There is a work requirement for individuals who do not have dependents. *Legal immigrants not eligible. Senate: FOOD STAMPS: *This is not handled in the Senate bill. Current wisdom is that changes in Food Stamp and nutrition programs will be included in the final bill when it comes to the floor.
House: SOCIAL SECURITY INCOME: *Addiction to drugs or alcohol is no longer considered a disability and individuals may no longer receive treatment and benefits for these addictions. Senate: SOCIAL SECURITY INCOME: *Addiction to drugs or alcohol is no longer considered a disability and those individuals may no longer receive benefits. *The Individual Functional Assessment (IFA) of whether individuals are qualified to receive benefits because of their disability is abolished. *The individual must fit into more restrictive definitions of disabilities which are covered in order to receive benefits. *The maladaptive behavior definition of a disability is abolished.
House: PENALTIES FOR THE STATE: *The bill lists specific penalties for the state, which are a reduction in the amount of the block grant, if the state does not provide certain services or fails to meet quotas or work participant rates. At most these penalties can amount to 25% of the block grant. Senate: PENALTIES FOR THE STATE: *The bill lists specific penalties for the state, which are a reduction in the amount of the block grant, if the state does not provide certain services or fails to meet quotas or work participants. At most these penalties can amount to 25% of the block grant.ACTION NEEDED : The Senate will probably not take up the welfare bill until after Labor Day when they return from their August recess, although it could come up as early as the end of July. All Senators need to be urged to oppose the bill; it is too fundamentally flawed to be repaired. It is also now time to call President Clinton and ask him to veto any welfare bill that will hurt poor women and children. Senators can be reached through 202-224-3121 and President Clinton can be reached at 202-456-1111.
The Department of Defense Authorization bill came to the House floor on June 14 with the restored prohibition against any abortions being performed at military facilities, even if paid for with private funds. Rep. Rosa DeLauro offered an amendment to strike the language on June 15 which failed by a vote of 196-230. Yet the Senate Armed Services committee provided some ray of hope on June 22 as they marked up the same bill. Senator Chuck Robb offered a motion to strike the restrictive language from the bill and it passed 11-10 (with all Democrats except James Exon (D-NE) voting with us and all Republicans except William Cohen (R-ME) and Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) voting against. The next step is the Senate floor; urge your Senators to keep this restrictive language out of the Senate bill.
The Treasury/Postal Appropriations subcommittee marked up its bill on June 28 with language reinstating the restriction on federal health insurance policies from paying for abortions. The Commerce/State/Justice Appropriations subcommittee marked up its bill on the same day, reinstating another restriction on federal funds being used to pay for abortions for women in prisons. The full Appropriations Committee defeated a motion to strike the restrictive language in the Treasury/Postal bill by a vote of 24-19. Full committee action will occur on Wednesday, July 19 on the Commerce/State/Justice bill and a motion to strike the restrictive language will be offered there as well.
The Labor/HHS/Education Appropriations subcommittee marked up their bill on Tues., July 11 without any of the restrictive amendments to Title X or abortion for poor women offered. However, the full Appropriations committee will take up the bill on July 20 and several amendments are expected. At risk in this committee is the Medicaid payment of abortions for poor women in cases of rape and incest, the current mandate on states to comply with the federal standard on Medicaid payment of abortions, and the Title X family planning program. Title X could face total elimination, a ban on distribution of funds to any group that also performs abortion or even parental consent for teenagers for birth control. Please refer to the back of this update for a list of the Appropriations Committee members; if your member is on the committee, ask her/him to oppose abortion and family planning restrictions on all appropriations bills.
On June 15, Rep. Charles Canady (R-FL) held a hearing on the Christian Coalition's "Contract with the American Family" provision to outlaw the D & X procedure and restrict late term abortions in his Constitution Subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee. The opposition portrays these abortions as "partial birth" abortions and leaves the impression that they occur in normal, healthy pregnancies on normal, healthy fetuses. The truth is that one of these situations is terribly wrong -- the woman's life or health is jeopardized or the fetus suffers from severe abnormalities and has very little chance of survival. The D&X (dilation and extraction) abortion technique is an extension of the D&E (dilation and evacuation) procedure which aborts the fetus intact.
Canady did introduce a bill the day of the hearings (HR 1833). The bill would ban "partial birth" abortions (with a definition so vague that it could extend to other late term procedures), making it a criminal offense if a doctor performs such a procedure. The only defense a doctor could make in using this technique is if the life of the woman was in danger and no other procedure was available to save her life (without regard to whether the other procedure was equally safe for the woman). Furthermore, the woman, the father of the fetus, and the maternal grandparents (if the woman is under 18) all have standing under the bill to sue the doctor for civil damages -- even if they were fully complicit and gave consent to have the procedure done.
Testimony at the hearing was very emotional. The antis used diagrams and assertions that the fetus is only "three inches from birth" when this procedure is done. On the pro-choice side, a doctor testified that this bill would interfere with good medical practice because it would prevent a doctor from using his or her best judgement in treating a patient. A woman who had had the procedure done at 7 months of pregnancy gave the most heart-wrenching testimony. It was only in the 7th month that she and her husband discovered the fetus suffered from severe fetal abnormalities, a condition known as trisomy-13. The fetus had no eyes, six fingers and toes, most of the major organs had formed outside of the body and there was no chance of life outside of the womb.
The subcommittee voted 7-5, along party lines, to pass this legislation. The full Judiciary Committee began its mark up on July 12 and will continue the mark up on Tuesday, July 18.
ACTION NEEDED : Contact members of the full Judiciary Committee (if your member is on that committee) and ask them to vote against HR 1833 when it comes to the committee for a vote. Congress has no business dictating what medical procedures doctors can and cannot use. This bill would replace medical judgment with micromanaged medical malpractice, and women will suffer for it.
House Judiciary Committee members:
Republicans: Henry Hyde, IL, Chair; Carlos Moorhead, CA; James Sensenbrenner, WI; Bill McCollum, FL; George Gekas, PA; Lamar Smith, TX; Steven Schiff, NM; Elton Gallegly, CA; Charles Canady, FL; Bob Inglis, SC; Bob Goodlatte, VA; Steve Buyer, IN; Martin Hoke, OH; Sonny Bono, CA; Fred Heineman, NC; Ed Bryant, TN; Steve Chabot, OH; Michael Flanagan, IL; Bob Barr, GA
Democrats: John Conyers, MI, Ranking Member; Patricia Schroeder, CO; Barney Frank, MA; Charles Schumer, NY; Howard Berman, CA; Rick Boucher, VA; John Bryant, TX; Jack Reed, RI; Jerrold Nadler, NY; Robert Scott, VA; Melvin Watt, NC; Xavier Becerra, CA; Jose Serrano, NY; Zoe Lofgren, CA; Sheila Jackson Lee, TX
The hearing, which lesbian and gay activists labeled a "lynching", featured copious anti-lesbian and gay rhetoric; for instance, the statement that frank discussions of AIDS transmission and preventative techniques violated some peoples' religious beliefs by showing homosexuality as a valid lifestyle. Seven representatives from NOW's Lesbian Rights program, the Human Rights Campaign Fund, and the AIDS Action Council donned blue rubber gloves and raised their gloved hands behind Dornan as he concluded his remarks -- to protest the recent Secret Service incident at the White House (when several Secret Service agents put on rubber gloves when a group of lesbian and gay leaders attended a meeting there) and to stress the necessity of continued AIDS education programs.
Rep. Dornan himself has introduced HR 862, which would prohibit federal funding which in any way would "promote, condone, accept or celebrate homosexuality, lesbianism or bisexuality." Dornan has stated," Diversity is a code word for homosexuality," and he plans to target federal diversity training programs next. We should expect anti-lesbian/gay amendments such as the Dornan/Helms bills to be attached to appropriation bills, which means that the battle over gay rights will have to be fought many times.
NOW has participated in lobbying and activities with the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, sent letters to targeted House and Senate members and joined other women's organizations in a march and demonstration at the White House (Women United for Equality). Patricia Ireland and leaders of these groups then met with White House officials, asking them not to weaken affirmative action. Also, Kim Gandy joined Rev. Jesse Jackson for a meeting in early March with senior White House staff, including George Stephanopoulous and Harold Ickes (with an appearance by the President and Vice President).
ACTION NEEDED: Write your members of Congress and President Clinton; tell them not to prohibit or repeal affirmative action programs. The White House address is 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., Washington, DC 20500.
Executive Order 11246 was an initial step by the government to ensure that qualified minorities and women had equal (or at least increased) access to the many economic, academic, and social opportunities available in American society. Since Nixon's Executive Order (and others with similar goals), Congress has passed many pieces of legislation which outline participation goals for minority owned and economically disadvantaged businesses in federal contracts.
The ability of Congress to enact legislation setting up affirmative action programs with regard to federal contracts, was at issue in the Adarand case. Traditionally Congress has been given broad authority under the Constitution to enact programs that have a goal of social and economic equality(See, Fullilove v. Klutznick, 100 S.Ct. 2758 (1980)). The primary reason for this Congressional authority was the fact that Congress is the enforcer of the Civil Rights Amendments (the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments). As such, it did not need specific findings of discriminatory acts. Rather, Congress could support its legislation with a goal of correcting past societal discrimination.
On the other hand, state or local governments could only enact similar programs if there was specific evidence of past discrimination by the state/local government entity which is the target of the legislation(See, Richmond v. Croson, 109 S.Ct. 706 (1989)). The primary reason for this tougher standard for states and local governments was that the Civil Rights Amendments were set up to limit state action. This stricter level of review for states provides a more difficult, but not impossible, standard.
Effectively, the Adarand decision, a 5:4 decision, reviewed a Congressional affirmative action program for federal contracts with the same strict level of review given previously only to state or local actions. This does not mean the end of these programs; what it does mean is that Congress can only enact these programs if there is evidence of past discrimination in the government entity whose contracts are the target of the legislation. To this end, Congress and the President have initiated studies of existing affirmative action programs, to ensure they are supported by such evidence. The findings of these studies is expected shortly.
Unfortunately, some members of Congress, including Senator Dole (R-KS) and Representative Canady (R-12th/FL), are incorrectly using this decision to demand an end to all affirmative action programs. These members intend to introduce legislation that would eliminate all federal affirmative action programs. This despite the fact that seven of the nine Supreme Court justices in this decision rejected the total elimination of race conscious remedies.
At issue in this case is a specific provision of the Voting Rights Act, sec. 5, which allowed the Justice Department to order a state to redistrict if it found that minorities are underrepresented in that state. The Justice Department, under sec. 5, had ordered the Georgia state legislature to create 3 majority-minority districts in its 1991 redistricting plan. Georgia contested this mandate.
The Supreme Court interpreted sec. 5 of the Voting Rights Act in such a way that it may effectively dismantle the Act. The Court opined that race may never be used as the sole factor in the drawing of election districts because, by implicitly assuming that race is an indicator of political preference, it discriminates against minorities. The Court also found that sec. 5 of the Voting Rights Act was not a mandate for affirmative steps to be taken for equality in the representation of minorities. Rather, it said this section should only be used when it is found that a state has regressed in its minority representation or minority access to voting.
After this decision was handed down, the Court agreed to hear two other redistricting cases, one from Texas and one from North Carolina. If the Court utilizes the same line of reasoning in these cases, it will be apparent that the Court is abandoning the goal of equal access to the political process for minorities in favor of "formal equality," which does not recognize the current social, political and economic inequalities that currently exists.
This decision, taken alone, means that Georgia will have to be redistricted along race neutral lines. If the Court adopts the same position in future cases, then all states will have to do the same. Ultimately, many minority members of Congress and state legislatures may lose their offices if they must run in new districts.