Thread by @jbendery

At last, the Senate Judiciary Committee is holding hearing this morning on the need to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act.

Its authorization expired 2 years ago. The Senate has failed to reauthorize it ever since.

Senate GOPers killed VAWA reauth in 2019.

They rejected a bipartisan VAWA bill that passed the House. They opposed its new protections for LGBTQ & Native victims of abuse + a gun safety provision. They also couldn't agree on their own bill.

Total fail. huffpost.com/entry/violence…

Fast forward to this year. Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) wrote an op/ed in April 2021 talking about her fight to reauthorize VAWA.

It was so full of mischaracterizations and spin that it was hard to make sense of. I tried in this thread:

https://twitter.com/jbendery/status/1381307253551153152

Today, Sen. Durbin, chairman of the Judiciary committee, says things have changed.

He says there's now "a strong bipartisan commitment" to produce the Senate's own VAWA bill, separate from what passed in the House.

(This bill does not yet exist.)

Durbin says Ernst has been working "closely" with him and Feinstein on a bipartisan VAWA bill.

I would very much like to see how they settle their differences in this bill.

Feinstein would normally be in this VAWA hearing, but Durbin says she's out because of a "serious illness in the family."

Ernst tells the committee she's been working for months with Dems (Durbin/Feinstein/Klobuchar) and GOPers (Murkowski, Cornyn, Grassley) to get a VAWA bill.

“We’re not there yet but good things in the Senate often take time.”

Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.) says a problem with the bipartisan House-passed VAWA bill is that its "gender identity provisions could make it more challenging for grant recipients" to serve rape victims and sex trafficking victims "for whom they provide space to heal."🤔

Speaking of Hyde-Smith: She was one of the 147 Republicans who voted to overturn the 2020 presidential election based on a lie about voter fraud that fueled a deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. huffpost.com/entry/republic…

Deputy AG Lisa Monaco brings up the case of Gabby Petito and notes she's just one of 89K missing persons cases in the U.S.

45% of those cases involve people of color, Monaco says, "including too many missing and murdered Indigenous persons."

More on the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women in here. Interior @SecDebHaaland has wasted no time trying to address this. huffpost.com/entry/deb-haal…

A little tense in this hearing.

Sen. Cornyn to Monaco: Such "audacity" to say DOJ sees a sense of urgency in responding to FBI's botched handling of sexual abuse allegations against Larry Nassar.

Sen. Whitehouse to Cornyn/GOP: Um, remember how you treated Christine Blasey Ford?

Oh my god Tom Cotton is using his time in this hearing on Violence Against Women Act reauthorization to talk about... critical race theory and mask mandates.

Monaco says the pandemic has "absolutely" increased the need to reauthorize VAWA.

Domestic violence service providers tell me the demand for services is outpacing the ability to provide services, she says.

"People are at home with their abuser in many respects.... Horrible."

Josh Hawley is up, acting very mad about AG Garland issuing a memo directing FBI to work with U.S. Attys + local authorities to discuss strategies to respond to uptick in threats against school board members b/c of mask mandates.

Here's Garland's memo:
justice.gov/ag/page/file/1…

Hawley: "Are you aware of any time in American history when an attorney general has directed the FBI to begin to intervene in local school board meetings?"

Monaco: "I'm not aware. And that is not going on." 😂

Hawley: "Really? This isn't about local school board meetings?"

Monaco: "The memorandum is quite clear. It's 1 page. It asks the US Atty community and the FBI...to convene state and local law enf partners to ensure that there's an open line of communication to address threats."

Hawley just using this hearing to try to gin up faux outrage about critical race theory + mask mandates.

"I'm not aware of anything like this in American history," Hawley says of FBI working with local law enf to address threats against school board members.

"This is truly extraordinary.... Unprecedented," says Hawley, the guy who raised his fist in solidarity with a mob of white supremacist Trump supporters just before they stormed the U.S. Capitol to try to stop the 2020 presidential election results from being certified.

Hawley's time has run out for more grandstanding.

"This hearing on the Violence Against Women Act will continue," says Durbin. 😂

Durbin has a copy of Garland's memo in his hands and clarifies what is actually says.

(It does not say what Hawley says it says.)

Hirono jabs Hawley, with a laugh: "It's alway surprising to me that the lawyers on this committee don't seem to understand the legitimate exercise of First Amendment rights and people who are threatening violence and in fact who engage in assaults on people." 🔥

Durbin wraps the hearing by saying he plans to introduce the Senate's Violence Against Women Act reauth bill with Ernst and Feinstein "quickly."

"We want to move on this. We need to get this bill to a president who is anxious to receive it."

I see you liking this tweet, @maziehirono