The House didn’t vote in its waning hours on reauthorizing of the Violence Against Women Act, a controversial piece of legislation opposed by many key Republicans because it would have extended domestic violence protection to lesbians and transgender individuals, in addition to illegal immigrants and Native American women.
The decision led to a swift rebuke from one of the bill’s key Democratic supporters, Washington Sen. Patty Murray.
“The House Republican leadership’s failure to take up and pass the Senate’s bipartisan and inclusive VAWA bill is inexcusable. This is a bill that passed with 68 votes in the Senate and that extends the bill’s protections to 30 million more women,” Murray said in a statement. “But this seems to be how House Republican leadership operates. No matter how broad the bipartisan support, no matter who gets hurt in the process, the politics of the right wing of their party always comes first.” Read More Here