House Judiciary Crime subcommitte Chairwoman Karen Bass (D-CA-37) and Representative Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA-1) have just introduced H.R.1585, the bipartisan Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2019! This important legislation reauthorizes VAWA grant programs and makes modest yet vital enhancements to existing law. Among other things, H.R.1585:
● Invests in prevention;
● Ends impunity for non-Native perpetrators of sexual assault, child abuse co-occurring with domestic violence, stalking, sex trafficking, and assaults on tribal law enforcement officers on tribal lands;
● Improves enforcement of court orders that require adjudicated domestic abusers to relinquish their firearms;
● Improves access to housing for victims and survivors;
● Protects victims of dating violence from firearm homicide;
● Helps survivors gain and maintain economic independence;
● Updates the federal definition of domestic violence for the purposes of VAWA grants only to acknowledge the full range of abuse victims suffer (does not impact the criminal definition of domestic violence);
● Maintains existing protections for all survivors; and
● Improves the healthcare system’s response to domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking.
Call your REPRESENTATIVE now and tell them to SPONSOR H.R.1585.
Then call your SENATORS and tell them the Senate needs to introduce a bill WITH THE PROVISIONS in H.R.1585 - half-measures such as a straight reauthorization are not acceptable, nor are rollbacks of existing protections for survivors!