On May 5, the House approved, by voice vote, the rule (H. Res. 258) for the conference report on the FY2005 emergency supplemental spending bill (H.R. 1268). The rule included language authorizing the House Judiciary Committee to file a supplemental report on the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act (H.R. 748), which the committee approved on April 13 (see The Source, 4/15/05). The House approved H.R. 748 on April 27 (see The Source, 4/29/05).
The Judiciary Committee report has been the subject of a weeklong controversy, with Democrats arguing that amendments they offered during committee consideration were mischaracterized in the report. A previous resolution (H. Res. 252) requiring the filing of a supplemental report was tabled, 220-196, earlier in the week.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) argued that his amendment to H.R. 748 “was very simple. It said that grandparents and adult siblings of the person getting the abortion should not be subjected to the provisions of the bill. It was reported as: ‘Mr. Nadler offered an amendment to provide sexual predators an exemption from the provisions of the bill if they were adult siblings or grandparents.’” He added, “The fact is in the entire debate over that amendment…no one in the minority mentioned the words ‘sexual predators.’ No one in the committee debate said this amendment might protect sexual predators. It did not occur to anybody. So on that level the report is dishonest, and the chairman or whoever else had anything to do with it owes this body an apology.”
Committee Chair James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) explained that at the mark-up of H.R. 748, “some Members offered amendments that would have created blanket exclusions from the criminal prohibitions in the legislation without any exceptions for those who would commit statutory rape or incest. The loophole those amendments would have created could be exploited by the very sexual predators; that is, those who would exploit vulnerable young girls and commit statutory rape or incest whose conduct the bill is designed to bring to light. Those amendments were accurately described in the committee report. All of the amendments offered would have carved out exceptions that could be exploited by sexual predators who sought to destroy evidence of their crimes by secretly taking a minor without her parents’ knowledge to another State to have an abortion.”
During the debate on the rule for the emergency supplemental spending bill, Rep. Thomas Cole (R-OK) said that the purpose of the supplemental committee report “is to change the description of certain amendments considered during the committee markup and process,” adding, “It is my understanding that the chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary has already prepared the supplemental report and shared its contents with the committee’s ranking minority member. I further understand that the chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary is prepared to file a supplemental report immediately after the adoption of this resolution and also to place it in the Congressional Record. This supplemental report will be part of the official legislative history of the bill and will amend the descriptions contained in the original report.”
Voicing his appreciation for the supplemental report on H.R. 748, Rep. Nadler stated, “While I would have hoped that this correction would have been accompanied by an apology and by an acknowledgement that this report was a violation of the tradition and norms of the House, that is, perhaps, in the regrettably poisonous atmosphere of the present day, unobtainable. I regret that things have reached such an unfortunate state. This situation is especially sad because it involves the Committee on the Judiciary’s official report on this bill, which contained false and misleading, indeed libelous, descriptions of the amendments I and my colleagues offered in the committee in good faith, and with the intent of protecting children and families in terrible situations.”
