Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler), a member of the Committee on the Judiciary.
Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask if the distinguished chairman wishes to repeat his tactic of last week of waiting until everybody else has spoken and then mischaracterize what we have said so that we cannot reply to him.
Is that his intent today? Is that why he is reserving his time now so that he can speak after everybody else has spoken?
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. NADLER. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. That is not my intent, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, is it his intent to let anybody on this side speak after he has spoken even if he closes?
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. NADLER. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, his side has the right to close as the proponents of the resolution.
Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his answer.
Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers) stated the point of this resolution pretty accurately and I think completely.
I want to deal with some misstatements that have been made or have been reported to have been made in defense of this unconscionable, lying report of the committee. It was said on the floor of the House last week that the question is one of intent versus effect. My amendment was very simple. It said that grandparents and adult siblings of the person getting the abortion should not be subject 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.''
The fact is in the entire debate over that amendment, in fact, in the entire debate over all of the amendments, all of which were characterized as dealing with sexual predators, in the debate in the committee over those five amendments, no one, no one in the majority, 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.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. NADLER. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, I would refer the gentleman to the statement made by the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Chabot) that is on the bottom of page 84 which talks about the potential of sexual predators.
Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, that is not with respect to my amendment. That was with respect to another amendment. That was with respect to a different amendment.
In respect to my amendment, which was characterized as dealing with sexual predators, nobody mentioned the words ``sexual predators'' or raised that.
It has also been said that the intent may have been not with sexual predators; the intent may have been grandparents and siblings, but could a grandparent or a sibling be a sexual predator? In that eventuality this would protect sexual predators.
Yes, in that eventuality the amendment would protect sexual predators. But, of course, the bill itself said that the parents could sue, the parents could sue the doctor who performs the abortion or the person who transports the minor. But the parent could be a sexual predator. The pregnancy could have been caused by rape or incest. This would give the sexual predator the right to profit from his own predation.
I, in fact, offered a motion to recommit to correct that defect in the bill, but the majority voted it down. Why, I do not know. But they voted it down because apparently they wanted sexual predators, in the unlikely event that the parent was a sexual predator, to be able to sue. There is no other interpretation possible.
But, as I said last week, if someone wanted to say on the floor of the House or in the committee, as no one did in the committee, that one has not anticipated the rare eventuality that a grandparent would be a sexual predator and maybe they should amend the amendment, that would have been a fair comment. Fair comment in a debate. It is not a fair characterization of the amendment.
There is a clear difference between expressing views in a debate and saying that one's amendment could be used by a sexual predator under certain circumstances, which might be a fair comment. It would be fair comment to say those circumstances are so rare that we do not have to worry about them or they are right or whatever. It is different. It is different, it is dishonest, it is a disgusting rape of the rules of this House to characterize the amendment in a one-sentence report that this was an amendment dealing with sexual predators. No, it was not. It would be just as dishonest as if we reported the bill and said this was a bill to allow sexual predators to sue doctors.
The gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner) and everybody associated with this owes an apology to the House and a correction to the American people.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, can we inquire of the distinguished chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary, who has not used any of his time yet, how many speakers he has?
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, we have five speakers.
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, last week, the House overwhelmingly passed H.R. 748, the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act, by a bipartisan vote of 270 to 157. One of the primary purposes of that common sense legislation is to prevent sexual abusers from taking vulnerable young girls across State lines for an abortion without telling the girl's parents.
At the Committee on the Judiciary markup on this bill, 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 loopholes 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 parent's knowledge to another State to have an abortion.
The amendments offered by the minority would have created those blanket exclusions for certain large classes of people who are not a minor's parents. Those classes of people were ``taxicab drivers, bus drivers, or others in the business of professional transport;'' ``clergy, Godparents, aunts, uncles, or first cousins of a minor;'' and ``grandparents or adult siblings.''
If any of the people described in the amendments offered became involved with a minor in a sexually abusive way, they would have been flatly excluded from the criminal prohibitions of H.R. 748, one of the primary purposes of which is to prevent sexual predators from continuing to abuse minors undetected. That purpose is reviewed extensively in the committee report in an entire section entitled ``CIANA Protects Minor Girls From Sexual Assault.'' The amendments offered at the Committee on the Judiciary markup were directly contrary to a primary purpose of the legislation. If the proponents of this resolution only understood that preventing sexual abusers from continuing to abuse a minor girl without a parent's knowledge is a primary purpose of H.R. 748, they would understand why the descriptions of their amendments are what they are.
If an amendment were offered to a bill that would make it a Federal crime to commit terrorist acts and an offered amendment would exclude conduct by, for example, taxi drivers, then that amendment would allow a taxicab driver to commit terrorist acts without being prosecuted. That would be an accurate description of such an amendment. In the very same way, those who happen to drive taxi cabs or work in the business of professional transportation should not be free to commit statutory rape and transport a minor across State lines to get an abortion without telling one of the girl's parents. And brothers, uncles, or Godparents should not be allowed to commit incest and then transport a young girl across State lines to get an abortion so evidence of their crimes are destroyed without telling one of the girl's parents about the abortion. There is nothing inaccurate with describing amendments that would do just that in just that way.
The incidence of statutory rape in this country is shocking. As a recent presentation given at a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Conference on the Sexual Exploitation of Teens showed, of minor girls' first sexual experiences, 13 percent constitute statutory rape. Further, the younger a sexually experienced teen is, the more likely they are to experience statutory rape. Of sexually experienced teens age 13 or younger, 65 percent experienced statutory rape. Of those age 14, 53 percent experienced statutory rape. Of those age 15, 41 percent experienced statutory rape. And also, blacks and Hispanics are much more likely to experience statutory rape. Creating blanket exclusions in the bill for large categories of people would create a huge loophole in the legislation that statutory rapists could exploit.
Regarding family incest, one recent Law Review article summarized the research regarding the prevalence of sexual conduct among siblings as follows: ``Brother-sister sexual contact may be five times as common as father-daughter incest.'' A survey of 796 New England college students revealed that 15 percent of females had a sexual experience with a sibling. Further, among those reporting sexual abuse, the incidence of abuse by cousins ranges from 10 percent to 40 percent among various studies; and 4.9 percent of women report an incestuous experience with an uncle before age 18; and 16 percent of rape victims are raped by relatives other than their father.
Carving out exceptions to the criminal prohibitions of H.R. 748 for adult siblings, cousins, and uncles would not protect young girls who are made victims of incest by their adult siblings, cousins, or uncles.
Further, pregnancy as a result of all these crimes is all too common. As one Pennsylvania court has pointed out, ``25 percent of incest victims become pregnant. The ratio is greater among victims of incest than those of rape because incestuous conduct is usually long-term and progressive, whereas rape is usually a one-time occurrence.''
Another amendment offered at the Committee on the Judiciary markup of H.R. 748 accurately described the amendment as ``creating an additional layer of Federal court review that could be used by sexual predators to escape conviction under the bill.'' That statement is true. That amendment would have created an opportunity for a sexual predator to escape conviction if they could make a showing to a Federal court that the judicial bypass provisions of the State law were somehow ineffective or somehow violated confidential information related to a minor's pregnancy.
If a sexual predator made a showing to the court of either of these issues, neither of which would expose the predator's crimes, then that sexual predator would completely evade the requirements of H.R. 748, which are designed to expose sexual predators and prevent future sexual abuse.
The final amendment offered was again accurately described in the committee report as an amendment that would have exempted from prosecution under the bill ``those who aid the criminals who could be prosecuted under the bill.'' That is true as well. That amendment would have excluded from the bill anyone who did not commit an offense in the first degree. The consequences of adopting that amendment would have been to allow anyone who aided or abetted a criminal who ran afoul of the criminal prohibitions of H.R. 748 to instead get off scot-free.
In sum, the effect of the amendments offered as described in the committee report would have been to exempt cab drivers, other professional transporters, and certain relatives who are not parents, from the criminal prohibitions of H.R. 748, and that would have prevented the parents from knowing when those perpetrators of statutory rape or incest were secretly taking their children across State lines for an abortion to destroy evidence of their crimes.
Now, to be clear, all of the descriptions of the amendments in the committee report are descriptions of the amendments and not of the intent of anyone offering the amendments. These brief descriptions do not impugn the integrity or motivation of any Member offering the amendment; they simply describe the consequences, regardless of intention, of the amendments. The description of the amendments in the committee report were all phrased in the conditional; that is, they make it clear that the loopholes created by the amendments as written could be used by sexual abusers of vulnerable minors, and could be exploited by certain people if those people sexually abused vulnerable minors.
The text of the privileged resolution before us is patently false. The resolution states that the chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary ``Explained that it was his purpose and intention to include derogatory and inaccurate captions in House report 109-51.'' I have done nothing of the sort, of course, and that statement is entirely false, as I have explained already. The text of the resolution also claims that ``the Committee on the Judiciary purposefully and deliberately mischaracterized the votes'' at the Committee on the Judiciary markup. That too is false. Indeed, the tallies of the votes cast are accurately set out in simple table form in the committee report for all to see.
Further, the resolution contains no allegation whatsoever that any Rules of the House of Representatives were violated, even in spirit, because such is obviously not the case, even to the authors of the resolution.
Finally, I offered to amend the text of the descriptions of the amendments offered in the sections of the committee report entitled ``vote of the committee,'' provided that those who offered the amendments acknowledged that, due to the way they were drafted, they opened the bill up to the harmful consequences of allowing sexual predators to exploit the loopholes such amendments would create in the bill.
Instead of admitting the obvious, and having the committee report amended to their liking, and moving on, they refused to do that because, for some reason, they felt they could benefit from extending the debate on this issue.
The minority had ample time to include dissenting views in the committee report, and they did so. For example, the minority views state that the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act is ``overtly hostile to families.'' The minority views in the committee report also describe the legislation as ``antiphysician and antifamily.'' Further, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler), over the years during which this bill has been debated, including this year, has gone so far as to claim that H.R. 748 is akin to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which required the return of slaves to their owners in other States.
As the committee report describes, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler) stated, ``It seems to me what this bill is, is really akin to the Fugitive Slave Act of the 1850s where you are enabling one State in the south, which had slavery, to reach over into another State and say, we want our slave back.'' And that is at page 56 of the committee report. And, at the Committee on the Judiciary markup of H.R. 748 on April 13, 2005, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler) stated, ``This bill is the only situation that I can think of since the Fugitive Slave Act of the 1850s where we have a young person carry the law of one State on his back like a cross to another State, to enforce the law of the first State in the second State where it is not the law.'' That is at page 81.
The statement of the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler) directly equates parents with slaveholders. But parental rights, which H.R. 748 protects, are not the rights of the slave owner. They are rights of loving and caring people: parents, who deserve a chance to work with their children through difficult times and express their love to their children in their children's moments of greatest need.
The Fugitive Slave Act was a catalyst for the Civil War, whereas the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act passed with overwhelming bipartisan support in the 109th Congress by a vote of 270 to 157, including 54 Democrats who voted for the legislation. America's parents should not be considered slave owners and their children slaves. America's parents are caring, loving mothers and fathers who simply want to know when someone else, anyone else is taking their own daughter across State lines for an abortion.
Now, when I hear statements that equate America's parents with slave owners and statements that equate America's children to slaves, I will tell it as it is.
And when an amendment is offered that would allow a sexual predator to exploit a loophole in the bill directly contrary to that bill's purpose, I will also tell it as it is.
Now, with all of these facts, I would suggest we put this issue to rest and be thankful that the House passed, in an overwhelmingly bipartisan fashion, a bill that would protect the fundamental rights of parents and the safety of our minor daughters everywhere.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 45 seconds to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler).
Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, it is amazing to me that the chairman of the committee continues to smear other Members of the House on this floor. The bill says nothing about sexual predators. The words sexual predator or abusers do not appear in the bill, number 1.
Number 2, by the chairman's logic any bill on the floor of the House that gives veterans benefits or gives educational benefits, gives benefits to sexual predators as long as it does not specifically exclude them; and any such bill could be fairly described as a bill to give benefits to sexual predators.
Number 3, I did use that language that the chairman quoted about the Fugitive Slave Act, but I was not comparing parents to slave owners. I was saying that the two bills were similar in that both would use, and that was in the quote, both would use the power of the Federal Government to export the laws of one State into another, and all of these things are opinions. Opinions are fine in the views. They are not fine in the reports of the amendment. That is where the smear is.