Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013

Floor Speech

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Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, there has long been bipartisan support for the Violence Against Women Act. Too many women are victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, and dating violence. Federal support for services to these women, and sometimes even men, has been beneficial to our country.

I support many of the provisions in the majority bill. There are consolidations of grants, cyber stalking, rural programs, assistance for individuals with disabilities, older victims, housing protections, and numerous other provisions I wholeheartedly support. There is overwhelming bipartisan support for 98 percent of what is contained in S. 47.

The process on the Violence Against Women Act in the 112th Congress was very disappointing, and I expressed that last year during debate on this issue.

Previously, the Violence Against Women Act was reauthorized unanimously--I mean prior to the debate last year and this year.

When new provisions were added in the past, prior to last year, they were consensus items. The law then was reauthorized by consensus. Something similar could have happened again last year, but it did not. New provisions were forced into the bill. Some of these provisions were controversial. Some raised serious constitutional concerns. But those on the other side of the aisle insisted on these provisions without change and refused any sort of middle ground. It appeared that the debate was more about blame and politics than it was about providing help to women in need.

Last Congress, both the Republican leader and this Senator offered that the Senate consent to striking a provision that violated the Constitution's Origination clause and then we would proceed to conference. Everybody knows that the Constitution's Origination clause says that issues involving raising revenue must start in the other body. Well, this bill raised revenue and, consequently, violated that constitutional provision.

Yet today, S. 47 has removed that provision that raised this blue slip problem in the other body. It does this only a few months after the majority refused to drop it and proceed to conference. What I just said tells you, if it had been done as they are doing it right now, we could have gotten this bill to conference and had something to the President in the last Congress. The willingness of the majority today to eliminate that unconstitutional provision demonstrates that we could have had a bill last year, and that is what I want to express to my colleagues as a terribly disappointing proposition for this Senator.

It is not true that unless S. 47 is passed exactly as is, various groups will be excluded from protection under the law. Current law protects all victims. Vice President Biden wrote the current law. Every Member of the Senate who was a Member of this body when the Violence Against Women Act last was reauthorized voted for that bill, which backs up what I have been saying several times during my remarks, that this could have passed last year as a consensus piece of legislation and has passed in other reauthorizations as a consensus piece of legislation.

Neither Vice President Biden nor any other Senator passed a discriminatory bill in the past. It is not the case that unless the controversial provisions are accepted exactly as the majority insists, without any compromise whatsoever, that any groups will be excluded.

The key stumbling block to enacting a bill at this time is the provision concerning Indian tribal courts. That provision raises serious constitutional questions concerning both the sovereignty of tribal courts and the constitutional rights of defendants who would be tried in those tribal courts.

We should focus on providing needed services for Native American women. But S. 47 makes political statements and expounds needlessly on Native American sovereignty. It raises such significant constitutional problems that its passage might actually not accomplish anything at all for Native American women, while at the same time failing to protect the constitutional rights of other American citizens.

Even the respected organization, the Congressional Research Service, has raised constitutional questions about the tribal provisions in this bill. I hope that whatever the Senate might do today, negotiations on these questions will continue. I am confident that if we can reach agreement on these questions, compromises on the other few remaining issues can also be secured, allowing the bill to pass with overwhelming bipartisan support.

So following up on some of the concerns I have raised this morning, I will yet today, if possible, offer a substitute that is much more likely to be accepted by the other body and then get to the President for signature.

I yield the floor.

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