Source document: https://docs-lawep.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/1696584963480.pdf (United States)
REAUTHORIZATION OF THE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN ACT HEARING BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, AND HOMELAND SECURITY OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION MARCH 7, 2019 Serial No.
116–7 Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary ( Available on: http://www.judiciary.house.gov or www.govinfo.gov REAUTHORIZATION OF THE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN ACT HEARING BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, AND HOMELAND SECURITY OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION MARCH 7, 2019 Serial No.
116–7 Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary ( Available on: http://www.judiciary.house.gov or www.govinfo.gov U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 36–562 WASHINGTON : 2019 COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY JERROLD NADLER, New York, Chairman ZOE LOFGREN, California SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas STEVE COHEN, Tennessee HENRY C. ‘‘HANK’’ JOHNSON, JR., Georgia THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida KAREN BASS, California CEDRIC L. RICHMOND, Louisiana HAKEEM S. JEFFRIES, New York DAVID N. CICILLINE, Rhode Island ERIC SWALWELL, California TED LIEU, California JAMIE RASKIN, Maryland PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington VAL BUTLER DEMINGS, Florida J. LUIS CORREA, California MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania, Vice-Chair SYLVIA R. GARCIA, Texas JOE NEGUSE, Colorado LUCY MCBATH, Georgia GREG STANTON, Arizona MADELEINE DEAN, Pennsylvania DEBBIE MUCARSEL-POWELL, Florida VERONICA ESCOBAR, Texas DOUG COLLINS, Georgia, Ranking Member F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR. Wisconsin STEVE CHABOT, Ohio LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas JIM JORDAN, Ohio KEN BUCK, Colorado JOHN RATCLIFFE, Texas MARTHA ROBY, Alabama MATT GAETZ, Florida MIKE JOHNSON, Louisiana ANDY BIGGS, Arizona TOM MCCLINTOCK, California DEBBIE LESKO, Arizona GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania BEN CLINE, Virginia KELLY ARMSTRONG, North Dakota W. GREGORY STEUBE, Florida PERRY APELBAUM, Majority Staff Director & Chief Counsel BRENDAN BELAIR, Minority Staff Director SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, AND HOMELAND SECURITY KAREN BASS, California, Chair VAL DEMINGS, Florida, Vice-Chair SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas LUCY MCBATH, Georgia TED DEUTCH, Florida CEDRIC RICHMOND, Louisiana HAKEEM JEFFRIES, New York DAVID N. CICILLINE, Rhode Island TED LIEU, California MADELEINE DEAN, Pennsylvania DEBBIE MUCARSEL-POWELL, Florida STEVEN COHEN, Tennessee JOHN RATCLIFFE, Texas, Ranking Member F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR. Wisconsin STEVE CHABOT, Ohio LOUIE
 GOHMERT, Texas TOM MCCLINTOCK, California DEBBIE LESKO, Arizona GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania BEN CLINE, Virgina W. GREGORY STEUBE, Florida JOE GRAUPENSPERGER, Chief Counsel JASON CERVENAK, Minority Counsel (II MARCH 7, 2019 OPENING STATEMENTS The Honorable Karen Bass, a Representative in Congress from the State of California, and Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security Oral Testimony .................................................................................................
The Honorable Doug Collins, a Representative in Congress from the State of Georgia, and Ranking Member of the House, Committee on the Judiciary Oral Testimony .................................................................................................

The Honorable Jerrold Nadler, a Representative in Congress from the State of New York, and Chairman of the House, Committee on the Judiciary Oral Testimony .................................................................................................
The Honorable John Ratcliffe, a Representative in Congress from the State of Texas, and Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security Page 1 3 15 Oral Testimony ................................................................................................. 16 WITNESSES The Honorable Ramona A. Gonzalez, Presiding Judge, State of Wisconsin Circuit Court, La Crosse, WI Oral Testimony ................................................................................................. .........................................................................................
Prepared Statement Professor Sarah Deer, School of Public Affairs & Administration, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas Oral Testimony ................................................................................................. .........................................................................................
Prepared Statement Ms. Julia Beck, Former Law and Policy Co-Chair, Baltimore City’s LGBTQ Commission, Baltimore, MD Oral Testimony ................................................................................................. .........................................................................................
Prepared Statement Ms. Roberta Valente, Policy Consultant, National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Takoma Park, MD Oral Testimony ................................................................................................. .........................................................................................
Prepared Statement LETTER, MATERIAL, ARTICLES SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD Letter from the National District Attorneys Association to Representative Jerrold Nadler, a Member of Congress of New York, Chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary and Representative Doug Collins, a Member of Congress of the State of Georgia, Ranking Member of the Committee ................................................................................................... on the Judiciary Letter from Survivor-Led and Anti-Trafficking Organizations with Programs to Representative Nancy Pelosi, a Member of Congress of California, Speak- er of the U.S. House of Representatives; Representative Jerrold Nadler, a Member of Congress of New York, Chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary; Representative Sheila Jackson Lee, a Member of the Committee on the Judiciary; and Representative Doug Collins, a Member of Congress of the State of Georgia, Ranking Member of the Committee on the Judici- ......................................................................................................................... ary 18 21 30 32 41 43 48 50 6 7 (III IV Page Materials from Karen Earl, Chief Executive Office of the Signature Programs, and the Jenesse Center, Inc., Domestic Violence Intervention & Prevention Programs to Representative Karen Bass, Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security ................................................... Materials on a report of the 2015 United States Transgender Survey-Race and Ethnicity of Adults Who Identify as Transgender in the United States submit by Representative David Cicilline, a Member of the Subcommittee on the Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security ............................................. 129 70 Materials regarding the National Consensus of Anti-sexual Assault and Do- mestic Violence in Full
 Support of Equal Access or Transgender Community ‘‘Transgender Population Size in the United States: Meta-Regression of Population-Based Probability Samples’’ submit by Representative David Cicilline, a Member of the Subcommittee on the Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security ............................................................................................... 111 Article—More than 250 Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence Organizations Condemn Anti-Trans Legislation submit by Representative David Cicilline, a Member of the Subcommittee on the Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security ................................................................................................................. 145 Article—University of California (UCLA) School of Law and The William Institute regarding Gendered Restrooms and Minority Stress: The Public Regulation of Gender and its Impact on Transgender People’s Lives, submit by Representative David Cicilline, a Member of the Subcommittee on the Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security ........................................................ 149 Report—Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Releases 2017 Hate Crime Statistics, submit by Representative David Cicilline, a Member of Congress from the State of Rhode Island and a Member of the Subcommittee on the Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security ................................................. 164 Article—Gender Identity Nondiscrimination Laws in Public Accommodations: A Review of Evidence Regarding Safety and Privacy in Public Restrooms, Locker Rooms and Changing Rooms submit by, Representative David Cicilline, a Member of Congress from the State of Rhode Island and a Member of the Subcommittee on the Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security ................................................................................................................. 169 APPENDIX The Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, a Representative in Congress from the State of Texas
 ....................................................................................................... 194 Letter from Kim Gandy, President and CEO, National Network to End Do- mestic Violence (NNEDV) to Representative Karen Bass, a Member of Congress of the State of California and Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security and Representative Brian Fitzpatrick, a Member of Congress from the State of Pennsylvania ............... 199 Letter from Esta Soler, President and Founder with Futures Without Violence to Representative Karen Bass, a Member of Congress from the State of California, and Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security and Representative Brian Fitzpatrick, a Member of Congress from the State of Pennsylvania ...................................................... 200 Letter from Dave Garcia, Director of Policy and Community Building of the Los Angeles LGBT Center to Representative Karen Bass, a Member of Congress from the State of California and Chairwoman of the Sub- committee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security and Representa- tive Brian Fitzpatrick, a Member of Congress from the State of Pennsyl- vania ...................................................................................................................... 201 Letter from Lynn Hecht Schafran, Senior Vice President, Legal Momentum, the Women’s Legal Defense and Education Fund to Representative Karen Bass, a Member of Congress of the State of California, Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security and Rep- resentative John Ratcliffe from the State of Texas, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security ................... 202 Letter from the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (NCAVP) to Representative Karen Bass, a Member of Congress of the State of California and Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security and Representative Brian
 Fitzpatrick, a Member of Congress from the State of Pennsylvania .................................................................................... 204 Page Letter from the National Task Force to End Sexual and Domestic Violence to Representative Karen Bass, a Member of Congress of the State of Cali- fornia and Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security and Representative John Ratcliffe, a Member of Con- gress from the State of Texas, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security ......................................................... 205 Written Testimony of Terri Poore, Policy Director, National Alliance to End Sexual Violence Concerned Women for America Legislative Action Com- mittee Statement for the Record ......................................................................... 225 Written evidence submitted by Dr. James Barrett, President, British Associa- tion of Gender Identity Specialists submitted regarding written Evidence by British Association of Gender Identity Specialists to the Transgender Equality Inquiry ................................................................................................... 229 Special Report from U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Sexual Victimization Reported by Adult Cor- rectional Authorities, 2012–15 ............................................................................ 239 Violent Men In Women’s Jail And Prison Facilities—Stories from New York, Massachusetts and California ............................................................................. 259 Concerned Women for America Legislative Action Committee 40th Anniver- sary 1979–2019
 ..................................................................................................... 261 WOLF, Women’s Liberation Front, US Equality Act: Gender Identity Impact Summary ............................................................................................................... 263 Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003, PREA Data Collection Activities, 2018, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics ............................................................................................................... 265 REAUTHORIZATION OF THE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN ACT THURSDAY, MARCH 7, 2019 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, AND HOMELAND SECURITY COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:00 a.m., in Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon.

Karen Bass [chair of the subcommittee] presiding.

Present: Representatives Bass, Nadler, Jackson Lee, Demings, McBath, Richmond, Jeffries, Cicilline, Lieu, Dean, Mucarsel-Powell, Cohen, Ratcliffe, Collins, Gohmert, Chabot, Steube, Lesko, Reschenthaler, and Cline.
Staff Present: Amy Rutkin, Chief of Staff; John Doty, Senior Ad- visor; Susan Jensen, Parliamentarian and Senior Counsel; Joe Graupensperger, Chief Counsel on Subcommittee on Crime, Ter- rorism, and Homeland Security; Monalisa Dugue´, Deputy Chief Counsel, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Secu- rity; David Greengrass, Senior Counsel; Veronica Eligan, Profes- sional Staff Member; Milagros Cisneros, Crime Detailee; Madeline Strasser, Chief Clerk; Moh Sharma, Policy Outreach Counsel; Lisette Morton, Legislative Director; Sally Rose Larson, Minority Counsel; Jason Cervenak, Minority Counsel; and Andrea Woodard, Minority Professional Staff Member.
Ms. BASS.

The subcommittee will come to order.

Without objec- tion, the chair is authorized to declare recesses of the subcommittee at any time.

We welcome everyone to this morning’s hearing on the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.

I will now rec- ognize myself for an opening statement.
I am pleased that the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security is holding our first hearing of this 116th Con- gress, about our critical duty to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act.

This law has been successful at attempting to change policies that have led to injustices, and too often, indifference to victimization and suffering throughout our country’s history.

It is important to review how we arrived at this moment.
This month has a special significance that is relevant to this hearing, because it is celebrated as the Women’s History Month.

In 1980, President Jimmy Carter first designated March 2nd through the 8th as Women’s History Week.
Seven years later, in 1987, Con- (1 gress passed public law 100–9, designating March as Women’s His- tory Month.
Seven years after that, in 1994, Congress passed Pub- lic Law 103–322, the Violence Against Women Act of 1994, which we call VAWA, a landmark piece of legislation which began with bipartisan support in both the House and in the Senate.

This year, we celebrate the 25th anniversary of VAWA, since President Bill Clinton signed the first VAWA into law on Sep- tember 13, 1994.

On this day, March 7, President Barack Obama signed our last VAWA in 2013.
And today, on the sixth anniversary of VAWA’s last passage, we are holding this hearing to address the urgency of now, in reauthorizing this vital legislation, which ad- dresses the needs of all victims and survivors of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking.

As a result of this historical legislation, which has unarguably proven critical in the lives of so many survivors, every State has enacted laws making stalking a crime, and strengthened their criminal rape statutes.
While this legislation is named the Violence Against Women Act, this is gender-neutral legislation, which re- sponds to the needs and care of all survivors—men, women, and children alike.

For centuries, women have fought vigorously to demand changes in our Federal law, not simply for their own benefit, but for others as well.

Because they sought progress, VAWA is no exception in that regard.
As Shirley Chisholm once said, You don’t make progress by standing on the sidelines whimpering and complaining; you make progress by implementing ideas.

We have made progress in VAWA 2000, 2005, and 2013, but the statistics remain alarming and unacceptable.

Domestic violence claims at least 2,000 lives each year.

Seventy percent of the victims are women.

Most intimate partner homicides in which a person tar- gets a spouse, boyfriend or girlfriend, are committed with firearms.
An astounding 17,500 victims disclose the use or threat of fire- arms being used during abuse.

We must hold abusers accountable, provide vital services, and promote safe environments where sur- vivors are protected.

The #MeToo movement continues to remind us that we can never remain complacent, and instead, we must al- ways shed light on the prevalence of violence against women, men, and children.
We must not ignore the even greater recognition by our citizens exemplified by the #MeToo movement, that we must insist on tak- ing action now, and we must act to reauthorize and strengthen VAWA so that it meets today’s challenges.

In the most recent 2018 impact report by the National Domestic Violence Hotline, more than 370,000 total calls were answered.

Of that amount, more than 200,000 calls, chats, and texts went unan- swered due to the lack of resources.
In those contacts made, 83,000 victims reported that their abusive situation involved children; 13,000 victims experience stalking; almost 7,500 cited suicidal threats from their abusive partners; while 4,000 cited thoughts of suicide themselves.

VAWA provides grants that help break the cycle of domestic vio- lence.

These vital resources save lives by assisting, women, men, and children, as they flee abuse and heal from trauma.
The grants also support training for law enforcement, prosecutors, judges service providers, and communities to provide comprehensive sup- port to victims, hold offenders accountable, and keep our commu- nities safe.
Prior to VAWA, law enforcement lacked the resources and tools to respond effectively to domestic violence and sexual assault.

Each reauthorization of VAWA has improved protections for women and men, while helping to change the culture and reduce the tolerance for domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking.

VAWA-funded programs have provided victims with critical serv- ices, such as transitional housing, legal assistance, and supervised visitation services.
VAWA has led to increased reporting of sexual assault, and increased ability of victims to flee abuse.

It has also helped address the unique barriers faced by rural, area—elderly, and disabled victims.

Despite these gains, much work remains to be done to address the unmet needs of survivors.

We must hold abusers accountable, provide vital services, and promote safe environments where sur- vivors are protected.
The #MeToo movement continues to remind us that we can never remain complacent, and instead, we must al- ways shed light on the prevalence of violence against women, men, and children.

We must not ignore the even greater recognition by our citizens, exemplified by the #MeToo movement, that we must insist on tak- ing action now, and we must act to reauthorize and strengthen VAWA so that it meets today’s challenges.
That is why I look for- ward to hearing from our panel of expert witnesses to help us un- derstand these issues, the successes of VAWA, and the need to do even more to strengthen the law.

It is now my pleasure to recognize the ranking member of the subcommittee, the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Ratcliffe, for his opening statement.

Mr. RATCLIFFE.
Mr. RATCLIFFE.

Madam Chair, if I may beg the chair’s indulgence to change the order of opening statements, so that the gentleman— the ranking member of the full committee, Mr. Collins, could be recognized for his opening statement.

Ms. BASS.

Absolutely.

Mr. COLLINS.

Thank you, and I appreciate it, and I appreciate the indulgence of the chairman.

I appreciate that.
I appreciate that.

Chair Bass, I thank you for holding this hearing today and share your belief that the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act is critical, and appreciate the opportunity to hear from our witnesses that are going to be talking about this.

The Violence Against Women Act was first signed into law in 1994, when the domestic violence was largely considered a hidden crime.

The law signaled awareness of the need to stop the growing tide of domestic violence and sexual assault.
While this law has helped us take great strides in the right direction, unfortunately domestic violence and sexual assault are still far too prevalent today, and those crimes continue to disproportionally impact women.

That is why we need to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act and make sure it is working and focusing on those it was intended to help.

House Republicans tried to reauthorize the VAWA Act through the end of fiscal year, but Democrats blocked that reauthorization.
We wanted to insure that this program remained up and running, while discussions continued about ways to improve the current law.

We remain willing and ready to work across the aisle, and with our Senate partners to reauthorize VAWA.
Unfortunately, my understanding is that the Democratic major- ity intends to introduce their VAWA reauthorization from last Con- gress, and it is my understanding—I just found out—to actually mark it up next week.

This radical legislation stands no chance of becoming law, and is merely evidence of the majority’s regrettable intent to weaponize this important piece of legislation to score po- litical points.

That is fundamentally unfair to women and all who depend on the services these programs provide.
I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today and working to reauthorize VAWA in a way that reduces violence, protects vic- tims, and ensures that the law works as intended.

I would also like to ask unanimous consent to enter into the statements from the Coalition Against Trafficking Women, the ‘‘Na- tional District Attorneys Association,’’ and a letter from a group, ‘‘Survivors Lead,’’ the organization, into the record.

And with that, I yield back.
[The information follows:] RANKING MEMBER COLLINS FOR THE OFFICIAL RECORD .
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15 Ms. BASS.

Thank you very much.

I am now pleased to recognize the chairman of the full committee, the gentleman from New York, Mr. Nadler, for his opening statement.

Chairman NADLER.

I thank the chair.

I thank the chair for hold- ing this important hearing today and for her leadership in the ef- fort to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act.
I also want to thank Ms. Jackson Lee for her longstanding and tireless efforts over the years to protect and strengthen the Act.

This critical statute, which we often refer to as VAWA, was signed into law in 1994, to help ensure that women in America are free from violence and free from fear.

At the time VAWA was en- acted, it was all too common for violent crimes against women to go without appropriate response and to remain unaddressed by the criminal justice system.
Although there is still much to do, VAWA represented a histor- ical shift in the Federal role in combating these crimes.

Congress began to take seriously its role in ensuring that communities in America have the tools needed to combat the crimes of domestic vi- olence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking.

Since then, victims, survivors, in the communities where they live, have relied on Congress to help provide the resources needed to prevent and investigate these crimes and to assist survivors.
And these programs and resources are, unfortunately, still nec- essary.

Every year, approximately 7.9 million women experience the crimes of rape, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner.

And an average of three women are killed every day by a current or former intimate partner.

VAWA, which is not gender exclusive, addresses the needs of men and women, children, persons with disabilities, homeless peo- ple, and LGBTQ people, among others.
The range of individuals VAWA helps is broad and is as diverse as our communities around the country.

Our engagement as a Congress with the issues VAWA addresses has only served to highlight the severity of these problems.

VAWA has changed the landscape of how we talk about the issue of vio- lence in the home, in the workplace, and in society at large.

More importantly, VAWA has had, and continues to have, a positive im- pact on people who rely on its assistance, whether directly or indi- rectly.
Through grants to State and local governments, the Office on Violence Against Women and the Department of Justice funds the work of thousands of advocates in preventing and addressing domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking, and in assisting in training law enforcement and victim advocates.
Grants administered through the Department of Health and Human Services provide funds for shelters, rape prevention and education, programs to address and reduce the sexual abuse of run- aways and homeless youth, and community programs to educate the community on domestic violence.

The reach of the work carried out under VAWA is vast, and we must continue to support it.
The goal of putting an end to domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking, once and for all, will only be achiev- able if we, as a Congress, are engaged and committed to it.

Because of its importance and success, VAWA was reauthorized on a bipar- tisan basis in 2000, in 2005, and again, in 2013.
16 Unfortunately, not only did VAWA expire without being reau- thorized, but because of the foolish government shutdown, we even had a lapse in appropriations for VAWA earlier this year, which jeopardized funding for domestic-violence shelters.
But our task now is not just to reauthorize VAWA, but to enhance and expand it and make it even more effective.

I know there are many people here today, including our wit- nesses and many of our members who have been working tirelessly to support victims and survivors as they seek to live full lives after suffering traumatic experiences.

Often, the people who do this type of work are survivors themselves.

Thank you for your hard work and for being here.


For them, and for all of our communities, we must reauthorize and reinforce VAWA now.

It is fitting that we discuss this issue during Women’s History Month, and I look forward to hearing from our witnesses and working with my colleagues on this important legislation.

Thank you and I yield back the balance of my time.

Ms. BASS.
Ms. BASS.

Now, it is my pleasure to recognize the ranking mem- ber of the subcommittee, the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Ratcliffe, for his opening statement.

Mr. RATCLIFFE.

Thank you, Chair.

I do want to thank each of the witnesses for being here today to testify.

As a Federal prosecutor, I had the privilege for many years of seeing firsthand the profound impact of the Violence Against Women Act.

I saw and I learned so much from working with the Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women.
But for all the women that I know, and that I saw VAWA has helped, as a prosecutor, I can’t help but think about and remember all of the women who weren’t so fortunate, women whose husbands or boy- friends put them in cemeteries because those husbands or boy- friends drank too much, or became jealous too much, or because they just liked to hit women too much.

And because of that, I know what is at stake, if we don’t reauthorize VAWA.

VAWA can and should provide all women a safe harbor who need one.
It can and should provide a means for all women to leave abu- sive relationships.

It can and should provide the counseling needed by any woman to survive the abuse and violence they have en- dured.

VAWA can and should facilitate and accelerate the prosecu- tion of sexual assault cases, so that women, as they wait for their case to go to trial, don’t have to live in fear that they might suffer more abuse or violence.
Madam Chair, we owe survivors of domestic violence a bill that doesn’t water down these services for women.

As with any proposal before Congress, we should be vigilant in conducting oversight to ensure that taxpayer dollars are used effectively, and because the principle objectives for VAWA programs are the mitigation, the re- duction, and the prevention of the effects and occurrences of domes- tic violences, then we should target those objectives.
We owe it to survivors and victims of domestic violence, an obli- gation to ensure that we are not duplicating grants that are housed at other various Federal agencies.
We owe them transparency and accountability and support for rigorous evaluations of existing VAWA programs to make sure that 17 these programs are working as intended for those they are in- tended to help.

These policies should be noncontroversial.


Who would object to requiring greater accountability in increased prioritization of the processing of untested, sexual-assault kits?

Who would object to providing protection for faith-based providers and religious organi- zations which work with survivors of domestic violence and human trafficking?
If we don’t protect faith-based providers and religious organizations from being discriminated against, then we are, in fact, reducing access for survivors of violence.

Madam Chair, as a prosecutor in cases involving violence against women, I never once asked a victim if she was a Republican or a Democrat.

I never once asked a rape counselor if he or she was a Republican or a Democrat.

I never asked the parents of a victim if they were Republican or Democrat.
I never asked because some things are more important than politics, and protecting women who need protection from violence is one of those things.

So it is my hope that this body, that this Congress, can agree on a bipartisan and noncontroversial reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.

That is my hope, but it is my fear that this committee’s majority will instead push forward with a partisan bill that is intended to score political points.
That is my fear, because when the current reauthorization expired on February 15th of this year, it did so because Democrats, now in the majority of this House, refused to include a simple extension for the reauthoriza- tion of VAWA, until the end of the fiscal year.

Last month, Madam Chair, Democrats indicated that they want- ed to use VAWA as a political bargaining chip.
I applaud my col- league, Congresswoman Lesko, herself a survivor of domestic vio- lence, for her dedicated efforts to enact a clean extension of the ex- isting law, a clean extension that would have ensured that VAWA, and the critically important role that it plays, would not have lapsed.
So as we move forward with today’s hearing, I echo her request for Members of this committee and of this Congress, to come for- ward in a bipartisan fashion to pass an extension of VAWA instead of trying to score political points against each other.
Instead of try- ing to score political points for once, it is my hope, and it is my plea that maybe this body can speak for all women who need our help to survive the abuse and violence they have suffered, and also to speak for those victims who weren’t so fortunate.

I yield back.

Ms. BASS.

I will now introduce today’s witnesses.

The Honorable Ramona A. Gonzalez is the presiding judge of La Crosse County, Wisconsin, and the President-Elect of the National Council of Juve- nile and Family Court Judges.
Judge Gonzalez serves as faculty on the domestic-violence issue for the National Judicial Institute on Domestic Violence, and is a past member of the Wisconsin Anti- Human Trafficking Task Force, and is a current member of the Wisconsin Judicial Committee on Child Welfare.

Professor Sarah Deer is a professor of women, gender, and sexu- ality studies in the School of Public Affairs & Administration of the University of Kansas.

In 2014, she was named a MacArthur fellow.


She is a member of the Muskogee Creek Nation, and is the Chief Justice for the Prairie Island Indian Community Court of Appeals 18 She has worked in violence against women for over 25 years and her scholarship focuses on the intersection between Federal Indian law and victim rights.
Ms. Julia Beck is a member of the Women’s Liberation Front and a former law and policy co-chair of Baltimore City LGBTQ Com- mission.

She represented Women’s Liberation Radio News at the 2018 Montreal massacre memorial, organized by the Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter.

Ms.

Rob Valente is a policy consultant for the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, a member organization of the National Task Force to End Sexual and Domestic Violence.
She has worked on each reauthorization—each authorization and reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.

Ms. Valente also served as attor- ney advisor to the Office on Violence Against Women of the U.S. Department of Justice, and was the founding Director of the Amer- ican Bar Association Commission on Domestic and Sexual Violence.

We welcome all of our distinguished witnesses and thank them for participating in today’s hearing.

Now, if you would please rise, I will begin by swearing you in.
Raise your right hand.

Do you swear or affirm under penalty of perjury that the testimony you are about to give is true and correct to the best of your knowledge, information, and belief, so help you God?

The WITNESSES.

I do.

Ms. BASS.

Thank you.

Let the record show the witnesses an- swered in the affirmative.

Thank you and please be seated.

Please note that each of your written statements will be entered into the record in its entirety.
Accordingly, I ask that you summa- rize your testimony in 5 minutes.

I will help you stay on time by using the timing light on your table.

When the light switches from green to yellow, you have 1 minute to conclude your testimony.

When the light turns red, it signals your 5 minutes have expired, and I will make sure you know that.

Ms. Gonzalez, you may begin.

TESTIMONIES OF HON.


RAMONA A. GONZALEZ, JUDGE, STATE OF WISCONSIN CIRCUIT COURT, LA CROSSE; SARAH DEER, PROFESSOR OF LAW, UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS, LAWRENCE, ON BEHALF OF SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS & ADMINIS- TRATION; JULIA BECK, FORMER LAW AND POLICY CO- CHAIR, BALTIMORE CITY’S LGBTQ COMMISSION; AND ROBERTA VALENTE POLICY CONSULTANT, NATIONAL COA- LITION AGAINST DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, TAKOMA PARK, MD TESTIMONY OF HON.

RAMONA A. GONZALEZ Ms. GONZALEZ.

Good morning.

Ms. BASS.


I think your—it is not on.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Oh.

Good morning.

Ms. BASS.

There you go.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

All right.

I have all of my notes in front of you in my statement, and based upon what I have just heard, I am not really going to say much about that.

Chairman Bass, thank you very much for the invitation here.

Ranking Member Ratcliffe, thank you so much.
Ranking Member Ratcliffe, thank you so much 19 I am a judge.

I am a circuit court judge.

I am on the front lines, and I sit in a place on the majestic Mississippi River that allows me to see the world from a different viewpoint than you see here in Washington, D.C.
I swear an oath to uphold the laws of my com- munity, and to keep my community safe.

It is my job to provide ac- cess to justice, to all of my constituencies and all of my citizens.

As a member of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, and as a president-elect, I also stand before you as one of the many jurists across the country that struggle with these issues.

These issues are about people, access to justice, and trou- ble,—trouble that they have every day.
Every day, in my courtroom, I see individuals who are arrested the night before on a domestic case.

I see those partners come into court and beg me not to impose no-contact orders.

They don’t want intervention that is ineffective.

What they want is the violence to stop.

How does that violence stop?

Because we train judges and we train law enforcement, and we have a different social norm on what we mean by dealing with this issue of domestic violence, sex- ual assault, teen dating, and stalking.
It is not about just women.

It is about human beings.

The trau- ma that has increased in our courtrooms today, based upon the cri- sis that families have, is an emergency.

It has been addressed by VAWA in the past.

It needs to be enhanced in the future.

Because what we intended with this legislation in the beginning, on that 24 years ago, was to end this violence.

We were not just to protect women.

We were ending the violence.

I would like to tell you a story.

A woman is arrested.


She has five kids.

They found that she took Lorazepam.

The officers are afraid that she may not be right to take care of her kids.

So law enforcement was called, everybody gets called, and in fact, she is arrested, her children are removed.

What we don’t know is that the other tip of the iceberg of this family, is that the father of these children is using domestic violence against her, terrorizing her and her family.
This, ladies and gentlemen, will cause a tremendous amount of emotional and financial difficulty and stress for my community if we do not address that woman’s issues.

But we cannot just take the picture of what happened with her drug use.

We cannot just take the picture of what happened with the violence from him.

It must be looked at as a wholistic family, and solve the problems ho- listically, with an understanding of the dynamics of domestic vio- lence.
That dynamic, we are better informed about after all these years.
It is really a great hope that we will end this violence, but it will not happen unless we open our hearts and our minds to under- stand that it is not just those who die, who lose their lives to this violence that are important, but it is those that must keep on liv- ing, those that must get up every day and go to work, those that must every day decide whether they will stay in that relationship or lose their homes, because there are people going homeless be- cause they cannot find housing as a result of what we do, com- pletely unintended.
I see these cases from the traffic ticket to the murder trial, and I am going to tell you in every single case, criminal or civil, the 20 issue of domestic violence has an impact on the people that I am seeing.

I may not see it, but another well-trained judge may see it.

Law enforcement may see it.


And it is all because of the programs and the efforts that VAWA has started.

I thank you for the opportunity today, and I look forward to an- swering your questions.
[The statement of Ms. Gonzalez follows:] .
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30 Ms. Bass.

Thank you, Judge Gonzalez.

Professor Deer.

TESTIMONY OF SARAH DEER Ms.

DEER.

Chair Bass, ranking member Ratcliffe, and members of the committee, I would like to express my deep appreciation and thanks for inviting me to testify today on the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.

I am a citizen of the Muskogee Creek Nation of Oklahoma, and I currently hold a position as professor at the University of Kansas.
And I also serve as the Chief Justice for the Prairie Island Indian Community Court of Appeals.

How- ever, today I am testifying in my personal capacity.

Each time VAWA has been reauthorized, it has included impor- tant provisions aimed at increasing safety for Native victims.

The last reauthorization of VAWA in 2013 was a particularly groundbreaking law that addressed numerous concerns that had been raised by Native women for decades.
From a Tribal perspec- tive, it was the most important reauthorization of VAWA to date, because it created fundamental, structural changes to Federal In- dian law, and reaffirming Tribal jurisdiction.

Despite the tremendous success of VAWA 2013, there is more work to do.

I will focus my testimony on areas where VAWA can continue to be strengthened to do even more to protect the lives of Native people throughout the United States.
The Department of Justice’s own statistics continue to reveal a tragedy, that Native women are living lives marked by repeated, continued violence.

According to the most recent data from the Na- tional Institute of Justice, more than four in five American Indian and Alaska Native women, or 84 percent, have experienced vio- lence, and more than half will experience some form of sexual vio- lence as well.

The ways of violence against Native, gay, lesbian, bisexual, two- spirit people is also unacceptable.
American Indian and Alaska Na- tive women are also significantly more likely to have experienced violence by an interracial perpetrator, and significantly less likely to experience violence by an intraracial perpetrator when compared to non-Indian victims.

This matters because Tribal Nations, with one exception, are not allowed to prosecute non-Indians for any crime.

Jurisdiction over a crime in Indian country does depend on the Indian status of the offender.
VAWA 2013 reaffirmed Tribal criminal jurisdiction over only three categories of crimes: domestic violence, dating violence, and criminal violations of protection orders.

VAWA 2013, however, did not go far enough in addressing the high rates of violence, sexual and domestic crimes committed against Tribal citizens.

It still leaves Tribal governments without the authority necessary to pro- tect women, children, and Tribal law enforcement officers over do- mestic-violence crimes.
Let’s begin by talking about children.

Native children, like their mothers, are exposed to very high rates of violence.

The Attorney General’s advisory committee on American Indian and Alaska Na- tive children found that American Indian and Alaska Native chil- dren suffer exposure to violence at rates higher than any other race in the United States.
Native children experience post-traumatic 31 stress disorder at the same rates as veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, and triple the rate of the general population.
At this time, non-Native people who perpetrate crimes, including sexual assault and murder against Native children, cannot be pros- ecuted by the Tribal Government, and this injustice must be rec- tified.

A recent example from a child case, a recent example of a child case from a Tribe located in Michigan, illustrates how this gap in the law has real consequences for Native victims.

A non-Indian man, in an intimate relationship with a Tribal member, moved in with her and her 16-year-old daughter.
After the man began making unwanted, sexual advances on the girl, sending inappropriate text messages, and on one occasion, groping the daughter, the Tribe charged the defendant with domestic abuse and attempted to tie the sexual assault against the daughter to a pattern of abuse against the mother.

The Tribal court dismissed the charges for lack of jurisdiction, and the defendant left the vic- tim’s home.
Four months later, he was arrested by city police for kidnapping and repeatedly raping a 14-year-old Tribal member.

This kidnap- ping and rape of a minor could have been prevented if the Tribe had been able to exercise jurisdiction in the first case.

I also want to mention the expansion of VAWA to address violence against Tribal law enforcement officers, because like State and law enforce- ment, a domestic-violence call is one of the most dangerous calls they will be asked to answer.
Members of committee, the next reauthorization of VAWA can turn the corner on violence against Native women, and I urge you, I urge you, to heed the call of the thousands of victims who deserve justice.

Mvto.

[The statement of Ms.


Deer follows:] .
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41 Ms. BASS.

Thank you, Professor.

Julia Beck.

TESTIMONY OF JULIA BECK Ms. BECK.

Thank you all for being here today, and welcoming my testimony.

I am honored to speak on the reauthorization of the Vio- lence Against Women Act.

I am a lesbian radical feminist and I am politically homeless.
I—people on the left have tried to silence me by using threats and other tactics of intimidation, a kind of hatred that most lesbians would expect to receive from people on the right.

I have been told to die in a fire, to get raped, and to choke on lady cock by members of the GBT community.

My so-called allies cast me out for speaking about male violence.

So I spoke with the only people who were willing to listen, people on the right, who usually never see eye to eye with lesbians or feminists.
My presence before you today is a result of bipartisan organizing, because protecting women and girls should be a bipartisan issue.

All women and girls are oppressed on the basis of our female sex.

One form that this oppression takes is male violence.

Male violence cannot exist in female space, because the distinct sex categories of female and male are mutually exclusive.

Therefore, women and girls benefit from female space.

In its earliest forms, VAWA defended female space.


In 2013, pro- tections for Native and global, majority women were enhanced, but one small addition to the Act dissolved all of its sex-based provi- sions.

VAWA now protects the nebulous concept of gender identity, defined in Title 18 as actual or perceived gender-related character- istics.

This is a circular definition.

It is illogical and legally irre- sponsible.

While sex is a vital statistic, gender and identity are not.
VAWA was created for women and girls, not for those who feel like or identify as female.

Woman is not a gender or a feeling.

No one has ever been able to explain what ‘‘feeling like a woman’’ means with- out using sexist stereotypes.

Women don’t need to identify as fe- male in order to be women.

Woman means adult human female.

New gender identity laws allow male people to claim womanhood.
The Violence Against Women Act has become the ‘‘Violence Against Anybody Act.’’ Its original, sex-based protections are now meaning- less, because men with gender identities, who commit violence against women, are protected by Federal law.

When gender iden- tity wins, women and girls always lose.

Many people think gender identity is the next frontier of social justice, but they couldn’t be more wrong.
Gender is based on rigid sex roles and superficial stereotypes that legitimize male domi- nance and female subordination.

This harmful hierarchy is some- thing that women and girls can never identify out of.

Female fetuses cannot identify out of sex-selective abortions.

Global major- ity women cannot identify out of genital mutilation or forced im- pregnation.

Women and girls are targeted by men because of our female sex, because the doctrine of gender codes females as subhuman.
Girl- hood is not all fun and games.

Girlhood is survived.

One in four girls will be sexually abused before they turn 18 years old, and 96 percent of people who sexually abuse children are male.

For dec 42 ades, women and girls have depended on VAWA to uphold and honor the integrity of female space.
The first piece of U.S. legisla- tion to even acknowledge the epidemic of violence against women is now a misogynistic Trojan Horse.

Half the population is living in a state of emergency.

Violence against women is a hate crime, but as of 2013, it is State-sanctioned as long as perpetrators feel like they are women.

People achieve nothing without first sharing a basis of unity.

Ev- eryone here, whether you are female or not, knows what a woman is.
Everyone knows that violence against women is a sex-based issue.

So for the sake of women and girls, please remove ‘‘gender identity’’ from VAWA.

Every woman and girl in these United States deserves female-only space.

Thank you.
Thank you.

[The statement of Ms. Beck follows:] .
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48 Ms. BASS.

Thank you.

Ms. Valente.

Ms. VALENTE.

I think we have to reset that or—oh.

Ms. BASS.

Just a second.

TESTIMONY OF ROBERTA (ROB) VALENTE Ms. VALENTE.

Thank you.

Chair Bass, ranking Member Ratcliffe, Chairman Nadler, and members of the committee, thank you all for inviting me to testify before you about the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.
It is not only 25 years old today, but the third reauthorization was signed into law this very day 6 years ago.

My name is Rob Valente, and I am a policy consultant for the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, the oldest, national coalition of grassroots advocates, an organization serving and advo- cating for survivors of domestic violence.
The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence is a proud member of the National Task Force to End Sexual and Domestic Violence, also known as the NTF, a coalition of organizations representing the thousands of rape crisis centers, domestic violence victim advocacy and shelter programs, and other affiliated organizations, including faith-based organizations, who serve millions of survivors of sexual violence, domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking.
The National Task Force leads the effort to reauthorize VAWA, ensuring that every time that VAWA’s promise is renewed by Con- gress, VAWA’s programs and laws are enhanced.

VAWA was first passed by Congress in 1994, encouraging law enforcement, prosecu- tion courts, and victim advocates to develop a coordinated response to these crimes, including in Tribal communities.
In VAWA 2000, Congress added legal and housing services and established the UNTB as a program for victims of domestic vio- lence and trafficking.

And in 2005, VAWA’s reauthorization further addressed the needs of culturally and linguistically specific popu- lations, children, and Native victims.
The result of the most recent survey by the NTF of the field for the VAWA 2013 overwhelmingly supported—I am sorry—the re- sults of the National Task Force survey of the field in 2013 over- whelmingly supported the two major improvements we obtained in VAWA 2013: anti-discrimination protections against survivors on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, recognition of inherent Tribal jurisdiction to hold accountable non-Native per- petrators of domestic and dating violence.
Between 2014 and 2016, VAWA grants provided more than 1 million victim services for survivors of domestic violence, sexual vi- olence, dating violence, and stalking, including almost 2 million shelter nights, 600,000 hotline calls, victim advocacy for almost 300,000 survivors, and legal services for almost 100,000.

For the current reauthorization of VAWA, the NTF’s 22 subject matter work groups now offer the following recommendations: First, we must maintain all the important gains of the past.
This is not the time to step back for our support for survivors.

The NTF now offers modest but critical enhancements.

My organization, the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, is dedicated to end- ing domestic violence, firearms, homicides.

You have heard some of those statistics from Chair Bass.
We know that when these laws 49 are implemented and enforced, homicide rates go down dramati- cally.

To end this epidemic of firearms violence in domestic violence cases, we need a VAWA that improves the enforcement of existing, Federal, domestic violence-related firearms laws, and closes loop- holes.
So we ask Congress specifically to allow the use of stop grants to prevent intimate-partner firearm homicides; require the FBI to notify State, local, and Tribal law enforcement when an abuser fails a Brady background check; authorize the cross-deputization of local prosecutors and law enforcement officers, especially U.S. as- sistant attorneys, and ATF agents, respectively, to help with en- forcement; provide dating violence and stalking victims with the same protections ordered—afforded to domestic violence victims; and protect victims with ex parte orders from firearm-involved abuse and homicide.
We also need a comprehensive definition of ‘‘domestic violence’’ for grant programs.

Currently, we have a definition of domestic vio- lence in Title 18 of the U.S. Code that describes the elements of the crime of domestic violence.

Abusers often employ abusive but noncriminal acts to maintain power and control over their victims, such as emotional abuse, isolation of the victim from support of friends and family, financial abuse, technological abuse, to control a victim.
For victim services programs that must address all these forms of noncriminal abuse, we need a Social Services definition to clarify what victim services may address in alleviating the suffering of vic- tims of domestic violence.

We are also asking for improvements in prevention, increase in support for prevention and for programs for children.

We want more done in the workplace to address sexual harassment.

We thank you for listening to us, and appreciate this opportunity to speak to you about this.
[The statement of Ms. Valente follows:] .
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61 .

 62 Ms. BASS.

Thank you.

Let me take the opportunity to thank all of the witnesses for taking the time to be here with us today.
We will now proceed under the 5-minute rule with questions, and I will begin by recognizing myself for 5 minutes.

Judge Gonzalez, I know that you are a member of the Wisconsin Judicial Committee on Child Welfare, and I wanted to know if you would speak a few minutes about the impact of domestic violence on the Nation’s child-welfare system.
The story that you recalled about the woman that had taken a medication and the children were removed, maybe you could talk about the impact of domestic violence, what happens to the children, and the impact on the child-welfare system.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

That story does not have a very happy ending.


That story was early on in my career before I had the kind of training, and before we developed the social norms to indicate that violence in the home permeates everything in the home, and it isn’t just if kids are in the room.

And that family, the ultimate result was, I sent that mother to prison, we sent that father to prison, and those children were in care for their entire lives.
Some were adopted, some went back into—into care, and, ultimately, I do not have happy children in that household.

Had I had the kind of training that was available now, when I started that case, I would have done things different.

My law en- forcement would have done things different.

We would have looked at what those dynamics were that we are working.

We would have looked at the trauma, that back then we didn’t even know that word really existed.

Ms. BASS.

Right.

Ms. GONZALEZ.


And all of that today, that case would come out completely different, because I would have law enforcement, I would have social workers, and I would have communities that un- derstand the problem.

Because we can’t do this alone.

And to—to Ranking Member Ratcliffe’s point, we do work with the faith-based communities, to help us get these jobs done.

Be- cause quite frankly, we don’t have enough resources to get it done.

Ms. BASS.

Well, what is done differently now?


It is my under- standing—and I hope I am wrong—that in the DV situation, that the children could still wind up being removed?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Because the issue be- comes if the—if mom is—a mom or dad, because this is really gen- der neutral.

If mom or dad is suffering from the terror of domestic violence, their ability to parent, their ability to parent those chil- dren is diminished.
And so without knowing what we are doing, we are removing those children and saying, Okay, you have a problem, so go fix yourself, and then come back.

That doesn’t work.

Ms. BASS.

Right.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

That doesn’t work.

The children have to be to- gether with the family, and we have to help victims of violence know how—learn again how to—how to parent.

And that includes the fathers, because—— Ms. BASS.

So this is still an issue.


Because, you know, the trau- ma of being in a household where there is violence is bad enough.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Exactly 63 Ms. BASS.

But then if you remove the children, separate them from the parent, the child is experiencing double trauma.

Ms. GONZALEZ.
Ms. GONZALEZ.

And many years later, when we have done our work, that child, who has been traumatized, is going to go right back to that biological family.

Ms. BASS.

Absolutely.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

And what have we done?

Ms. BASS.

Well, let me ask Professor Deer, you talked about Tribes not being able to prosecute non-Indians.

So if the person that—in the story that you told, that committed the rape outside, it was of an Indian woman?

Ms.

DEER.

Yes.

Ms. BASS.

Or child, right?

Ms.

DEER.

Yes.


Both—both the mother and daughter.

Ms. BASS.

So if a person goes onto a Tribe, violates a women and then leaves, what happens?

I understand the Tribe can’t prosecute.

Is it a situation where the offender gets off?

I mean, nobody pros- ecutes them at all?

Nobody goes after them because the crime took place on a Tribe?

Ms.

DEER.

There is concurrent jurisdiction, depending on the Tribe of the State.

I mean, Federal Indian law is a matrix of some sort.
So, depending on which Tribe you are talking about, the Fed- eral Government or the State government could have concurrent jurisdiction over that crime.

The problem is—— Ms. BASS.

Why can’t Tribes prosecute non-Indians?

Ms.

DEER.

Tribes cannot prosecute non-Indians because the Su- preme Court ruled in 1978, that Tribes had lost certain aspects of jurisdiction, but I will note that one of the final lines in the Oli- phant decision was that Congress has the power to restore that ju- risdiction.
Ms. BASS.

So that is something that we could change?

Ms.

DEER.

Absolutely.

Ms. BASS.

So—okay.

And you mentioned that—but this bill does not address that?

Ms.

DEER.

I am sorry?

Ms. BASS.

The current proposal that is under discussion.

Ms.

DEER.

I am not sure I know—I am not sure I know which version we would be talking about, but I am advocating for, and I believe many Native organizations are advocating for criminal ju- risdiction over crimes against children committed by non-Indians.
Ms. BASS.

And—okay.

And you mentioned that one Tribe can.

Which Tribe can do that?

Ms.

DEER.

I am sorry?

Ms. BASS.

Didn’t you say that there was one Tribe that was able to prosecute, or there is none, period?

Ms.

DEER.

Oh, I am sorry.

With the exception being the domestic violence crimes.

VAWA 2013 does allow certain Tribes that meet certain benchmarks to prosecute, but only for cases of domestic vio- lence, dating violence, and protection orders.
So anything else—sex- ual assault, child abuse, homicide—— Ms. BASS.

Oh, I see.

I see.

Ms.

DEER.

Those crimes cannot be prosecuted by Tribal govern- ments.

Ms. BASS.

Pretty crazy 64 Ranking Member Ratcliffe.

Mr. RATCLIFFE.

Thank you, Chair.

Ms. Beck, I enjoyed your testi- mony.


As a self-described radical, lesbian feminist, I want to make sure that I—that the record is clear.

You are not opposed to a gen- der identity ideology or those that question their birth gender.

You are just opposed to the—its inclusion into legislation specifically de- signed to protect biological women at birth?

Is that fair?

Ms. BECK.

No.

Mr. RATCLIFFE.

Okay.

Ms. BECK.

That is not fair.

Thank you for asking, though.

Gender is not a biological reality.


Sex is a biological reality.

Like I said, ‘‘gender’’ describes the social expectations of behavior based on a person’s sex.

So women, female people, are expected to be feminine.

We are expected to sit tight and look pretty.

Men are expected to be strong and never cry.

That is gender.

And that should never be protected.

We should actually abolish those kinds of expectations because they do not benefit women and girls.

They actually don’t benefit men either.


So I don’t agree with legislation that protects this idea of gender, or an identity with gender, because gender itself should not—it doesn’t serve people, and we should not legislate on the basis of it, because it is always changing and it hurts.

Gender hurts.

Mr. RATCLIFFE.

So thanks for clarifying that.


So with that, let me ask you: Do you believe that decisions that allow biological males access to programs and services that are intended to serve females actually pose a threat to those females?

Ms. BECK.

Of course, yes.

The majority of the crime committed on this planet is committed by men.

And when I say ‘‘men,’’ I mean male people.


So, yes, if any male person can identify himself as a woman, or use a gender-identity legislation to call himself a woman or call himself female, then he can go into a woman’s space.

Preda- tory men will do that, and they already have done that, in order to hurt women and girls.

This is already happening.

Mr. RATCLIFFE.

Thank you, Ms. Beck.

I want to yield the balance of my time to my colleague from Arizona, Mrs. Lesko.

Mrs. LESKO.
Mrs. LESKO.

Thank you very much, Ranking Member.

And thank you, Madam Chairman, for bringing this most important issue in front of us.

I am a survivor of domestic violence.

And I am one of the fortu- nate ones, because I left my abusive ex-husband over 25 years ago.

Never would have dreamed in a million years that I would be sit- ting here as a U.S. Congresswoman, so it gives hope to every single domestic-violence victim out there that you can do whatever you want.
I am also the co-chairwoman of the Congressional Caucus for Women’s Issues.

And I have spoken to my counterpart on the Dem- ocrat side, and we really do want to work in a bipartisan fashion to protect women.

I am also on an advisory council for domestic violence shelter in my congressional district, and I am also the co-chairwoman of the bipartisan working group to end domestic violence.

So if you haven’t figured it out, this is kind of an important issue to me.
So I am really trying to work in a bipartisan fashion to get some- thing done here.

My staff has reached out a number of occasions 65 to my Democrat counterparts that I believe are involved in design- ing this new VAWA legislation, and haven’t had success yet, get- ting together.
And my chief of staff was recently at a meeting with the Senate, both House and Republican Senate members—I am sorry—both House and Senate, both Republican and Democrat Members, and was told in that meeting that the House Democrats do not want to negotiate on this bill until they introduce their own bill.

And so, I hope we can do that and get it done.

Prior to 2013, the reauthorization of VAWA was actually quite noncontroversial.
Unfortunately, in 2013, it became controversial, and it may even be more controversial and partisan now.

And I hope that we can work together, because this is just too important of an issue.

I do want to work with my Democratic colleagues from the other side.

We need to reauthorize this.

We need to work in a bipartisan fashion, because as was stated, this happens to so many women.

It doesn’t matter if they are Republican, Democrat, Liber- tarian.

It doesn’t matter.
It doesn’t matter.

This is a problem, we need to fix it, and I stand ready to work in a bipartisan fashion to fix it.

Thank you.

And I yield back my time that you gave me.

Thank you.

Chairman NADLER [presiding].

Thank you.

I now yield myself 5 minutes.

Let me begin by saying, with respect to the statement of Ms. Beck, that she is entitled to her opinion, but I can’t disagree with her more when it comes to gender identity.
Frankly, I found your statement that we should not protect transgender people, against crimes under VAWA, offensive.

Gender is biological.

It is not a so- cial construct.

All the scientific evidence tells us that.

The issue against—of violence against transgender women and men, against transpeople, is a significant problem, and it is en- tirely appropriate for this Congress and VAWA to address it.
We have a history of defining certain groups as outside the pale, of de- fining certain groups as not deserving of civil rights or human rights or protection.

That used to include all gay people.

We have made progress on that front.

This is the latest.

This is the latest.

And we have to expand our horizons to understand that transgender people are human, they are what they are, not by choice, any more than anyone else is, and that they are entitled to the protections of law against violence.
Let me ask Ms. Valente: Can you tell us why Congress chose to add domestic violence prohibitions to the Federal firearms laws in 1994 and 1996?

And are those prohibitions sufficient to address the most dangerous cases of firearms violence in domestic violence cases?

Ms. VALENTE.

Thank you for asking that question.

Domestic-vio- lence homicides are primarily by firearms.
And so in 1994, victim advocates brought that knowledge and that—the serious anecdotes to Congress, and there was an understanding that the most dan- gerous time was when a woman sought a protection order, or any survivor of domestic violence sought a protection order.

The retalia- tion after that was often severe.

When you read newspaper articles about domestic-violence homi- cides, you will also find that too often, it comes right after the issuance of a protection order.
So that was added in 1994, but what 66 we found was, we had a gap.

If you had a felony crime of domestic violence, or any felony crime, you could not possess a firearm.
If you were subject to a protection order—a certain kind of protection order, you could not possess a firearm, but a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence, which is how most cases were handled as con- victions, was not covered.

So that was added in 1996 through the Lautenberg Amendment.
So the legislative history of that is understanding that, number one, the justice system tends to treat domestic violence as a lesser crime, and charges it in a lesser way, and deals with it in a lesser way, than other crimes; that if those same acts had been com- mitted against a stranger, they would probably be felony-level crimes.

And then added this, protection, knowing that this is the way that the justice system responds, making sure that this is covered.
The gaps we have now, that was—in the day when that was done, the understanding was that victims of domestic violence were inti- mate partners who were defined as people who were married, for- merly married, cohabiting, formerly cohabiting, or having a child in common.

We did not know that the world would reach the place that we are today, where there are so many dating partners who do not meet any of those definitions.
And now, more than half of the folks who apply for protection orders may fall into that category.

Chairman NADLER.

So we have to expand the definitions?

Ms. VALENTE.

We are leaving half of our population uncovered.

Chairman NADLER.

Okay.

I had one more question for you.

And that is, judges issuing domestic violence protective orders often re- quire respondents to transfer their firearms to law enforcement.
But one study found that only about 10 percent of respondents ac- tually complied with that requirement.

How can VAWA help en- sure that adjudicated abusers directed by a court to relinquish their firearms actually do so?

Ms. VALENTE.

This is so near and dear to my heart.

We have— we have excellent laws.

We need to enforce them.

We need the tools to enforce them, and we need the resources to make those tools available.

Law enforcement—I speak with law enforcement regularly.
I just came back from Dallas, where I spoke with several law-enforcement agencies.

They are all eager to do the court-or- dered firearms removal, but they do not have the staffing to do this.

As you might imagine—— Chairman NADLER.

So very briefly, because I have one more question.

Ms. VALENTE.

Yeah.

Chairman NADLER.

What should we do?

Increase staffing or what?

Ms. VALENTE.

Provide funding through the stop—make it a pur- pose area in the Stop Violence Against Women Act.

Chairman NADLER.
Chairman NADLER.

Okay, thank you.

Professor Deer, in the 8 seconds that I have left, I will ask the question, you can answer it.

Why is housing such an important part of VAWA if what we are trying to address is a response to do- mestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking?

Ms.

DEER.

I am sorry.

Could you repeat the question?
DEER.

I am sorry.

Could you repeat the question 67 Chairman NADLER.

Why is housing such an important part of VAWA if what we are trying to address is a response to domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking?

Why hous- ing?

Ms.

DEER.


Well, I would—I would suppose that one of the major—well, one of the major reasons that women are homeless is because of domestic violence.

Women are driven from their homes.

In many places, there aren’t shelters, or the shelters are full, and so there has to be a place for them to go—transitional housing, per- manent housing—to help women and their children pick up the pieces and find a safe path.

Chairman NADLER.

Okay.

Thank you very much.


My time is expired, and I recognize the gentlelady from Arizona, Congresswoman Lesko.

Mrs. LESKO.

Thank you very much, Mr.

Chair.

I have several questions and, first of all, I want to say thank you to all of you for coming here and for all of the work that you do to—to protect women, and so I appreciate all of you.

My question— first question is for Julia Beck.


And we only have 5 minutes, so in a few words, could you describe your main goal in testifying here today?

Ms. BECK.

My main goal was to share a radical feminist perspec- tive on the sex-based violence that all women and girls face and to also shed light on the kinds of male violence that lesbians face from the GBT community.

Mrs. LESKO.

Thank you.


And can you describe, you did a little bit in your opening statement, the experience that you have had as a member and advocate for the LGBTQ community as you have spoken out against gender identity protection laws?

Like, what has happened to you?

Ms. BECK.

Right.

So I was on the Baltimore city’s commission for LGBTQ people.

It was an LGBTQ commission, and I had talked about the threat of violence that male perpetrators pose to women in prison.
In the U.K., there is a great example of a male rapist who called himself a woman, he called himself Karen, and without undergoing any medical or social interventions, he was transferred from a male prison to a female prison where he then sexually as- saulted two women.

He has now been transferred back to a male prison.

But I brought this example up as something that could happen because it is happening in other countries.
I—I brought it up be- cause it could happen in Baltimore, and I didn’t want that to hap- pen in my city.

And because I talked about that, I was accused of violence and I was removed from the commission, and a man who calls himself a lesbian is now in my place.

Mrs. LESKO.

Okay.

That took a second for me to process that in my head.

Thank you.

You know, you had brought up a case about a man identifying as a woman going in a woman’s prison, right, and then raping women?

Ms. BECK.

Yes.

Mrs. LESKO.


Are you familiar at all with—there is a case McGee v.—I don’t know if I am saying it right—Poverello House case cur- rently being litigated in the Ninth Circuit Court.
In that case, nine 68 women have sued a Fresno homeless shelter accusing the nonprofit of allowing a transgender biological man claiming to be a woman to sexually harass them.
And so I guess, you know, to me, it is— do you think it is a concern that there are people that might be gaming the laws and pretending, I guess, that they are a woman in order to attack women in, let’s say, a domestic violence shelter designed for women?

Ms. BECK.

Of course.

And this is already happening.

Like I talked about Karen Wood, the male rapist who took advantage of these allowances.

We know that predatory men will do anything to gain access to victims.
This is a legal disaster because predatory men are already taking advantage of gender-identity legislation in order to gain access to women and girls in vulnerable states of un- dress, women and girls who have survived sexual violence.

And so, yes, this is going to be taking advantage of because it already is being taken advantage of by predatory men.

Mrs. LESKO.

Thank you for that testimony.


I do want to share with the committee that I did talk to one of the big organizations in Arizona that I am involved with that helps domestic violence victims, and they have said there has been a number of instances where they have had to deal with it where men, I guess, are pretending or—that they are a woman.

I don’t know.

Mr. CICILLINE.

Madam chair, I would ask for a point of personal privilege.
I think the suggestion that transgender individuals are pretending they are of a different gender is deeply offensive.

I would ask—— Mrs. LESKO.

Thank you, sir.

And maybe that is not the right word, but I talked to, sir, and committee, I actually talked to the people with the boots on the ground that have domestic violence shelters.
And maybe that is not the right word, and I didn’t intend it to be offensive, but people that—males who were identifying as a woman were actually trying to find the women in the domestic violence shelter.

And so I am not saying that happens all of the time, but I know I talked to an Arizona organization where it has happened.

And so—is my time up?

Thank you.

Ms. BASS.

Yes.

Thank you, Representative Lesko.


Before I call on our next member, let me just ask unanimous con- sent to add to the record a statement and documents from the Jenesse Center of Domestic Violence Intervention and Prevention Program Executive Director Karen Earl.

Unanimous consent?

Without objection.
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 98 Ms. BASS [presiding].

Representative Jackson Lee.

Ms. JACKSON LEE.

Thank you.


Let me thank the gentlelady from California and all of my col- leagues for what is a commitment to saving lives and recognizing how long we have been suffering and how far we have come.

Judge, you mentioned that we are all human beings, and I think that is a very important statement, because I think it reflects upon some of the discussion that we have had about gender identity.
And I associate myself with the remarks of Mr. Nadler, that it is impossible to leave out victims, whoever they are.

But my question to you is specific.

I want to focus on the human beings, and I am trying to ask a lot of questions, so I appreciate just an abbreviated answer.

But in your position, what has and what will the additional fund- ing and outreach language help you, as it relates to domestic vio- lence, as it relates to you dealing with law enforcement and those who come before you?
How will that STOP grant, for example, that I am sure you are familiar with, how will that help you doing your work?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

The STOP grant makes it possible for us to co- ordinate as stakeholders, to educate law enforcement, prosecutors, judges, on the dynamics of this insidious social norm that is some- times accepted but needs to be erased.

It is crucial to us seeing the dynamics of this problem.

But may I just make one comment on the human being, please?
In 24 years of being on the bench, I have seen suffering, suf- fering from young men and women, particularly adolescents, who are struggling with who they are as human beings.

I have never seen a young man put himself through the grief that it would be to identify as a woman to get to another young woman to rape her.

That has just never been the experience.

What I have seen is those individuals being tossed out on the street and becoming victims of trafficking because they have no place to go.
Ms. JACKSON LEE.

And that is what we saw, and we will see that in the work that we have done.

I thank you for that.

Let me also acknowledge the National Task Force to end Sexual and Domestic Violence for the work that they have done over the years.

Professor Deer, let me quickly get to you, because we were pas- sionate about empowering the Indian community.
And so would you just reinforce the importance of having the ability of extending jurisdiction to help Tribes have jurisdiction over non-native offend- ers?

Just how important is that?

Ms.

DEER.

Well, the vast majority of perpetrators, according to the Department of Justice, who commit crimes against native peo- ple are non-Indians.

So if that happens on a reservation, unless it is domestic violence, because that was addressed in 2013, the Tribe can do absolutely nothing.

They can’t arrest.
They can’t arrest.

They can’t investigate.

They cannot prosecute.

So you have children, native children who are victimized by their non-native fathers who cannot be held ac- countable criminally at the Tribal level.

We also can’t prosecute non-Indians who commit acts of violence against their Tribal police officers.
So Tribal police officers are responding to a very high 99 lethality call, right, and if they are in any way battered or injured by a non-Indian, the Tribe again has no control over any of it.

Ms. JACKSON LEE.

So any extension helps save lives—— Ms.

DEER.

Absolutely.

Ms. JACKSON LEE [continuing].


And gives dignity to those who have been assaulted.

Ms.

DEER.

Yes.

If I can just quote the former Secretary of Indian Affairs, Kevin K. Washburn.

He said a community that cannot cre- ate its own definition of right and wrong cannot be said in any meaningful sense to have achieved true self-determination.

Ms. JACKSON LEE.

Thank you.

Ms.

DEER.

This is vital.

Thank you.

Ms. JACKSON LEE.

Ms. Valente, may I raise a question with you?


And as I do that, I want to offer my thoughts to those who I knew in my district, the victims of domestic violence, like Brittany Smith who was 23 years old and was gunned down last year in Houston by her boyfriend and San Diego-based Marine, nor can we forget Charlene Caldwell, a mother and grandmother beaten to death last year by a baseball bat at the hands of her boyfriend in Houston.
Dealing with this over the years, let me again focus on the im- portance of a storage scheme as relates to guns.

And would you re- iterate again the weapon of choice as relates to domestic violence, who then impacts not only the two adults but children as well.
Since we have had incidences where the domestic abuser has come and killed, in many instances, the mother and the children, and the importance of legislation that expands that and expands grant funding like STOP and other expanded outreach dollars to reach individuals, if you would.

Ms. VALENTE.

Thank you.


We have many good models to deal with this and to improve this in communities, and they often in- volve coordination between the Federal government and local gov- ernments, because each has a strength to bring to the work that is done.
This version of VAWA, we hope, will include that language that both creates, just like Project Safe Neighborhoods, that link- age between the Federal and the local so that all those strengths are brought together, as well as the funding that can come through the STOP program.

That will give communities the ability to build the protocols and the resources and the staffing.

Ms. JACKSON LEE.

I thank the gentlelady.

Thank you very much.

Ms. BASS.

Thank you.

Representative Cline.

Mr. CLINE.


Thank you, Madam chair.

I want to thank our witnesses for being here today.

I want to as- sociate myself with the comments of the gentlelady from Texas.

This is about the victims, and we should be focused on them and on their well-being.

I served as a prosecutor for nearly a decade focusing on domestic violence cases, working in juvenile and domestic relations courts, and, Judge, you have my admiration.
That is, in my mind, the most challenging judicial position across the entire bench, so thank you for your service.

I also, through my work on the board of a local domestic violence shelter, Project Horizon in Virginia, got to see up close a lot of the challenges that are being faced in our shelters.
And Mrs. Lesko 100 asked some very pointed questions that go right to the heart of the challenges facing a lot of our shelters right now.

But I want to ask the judge a couple of questions.


Having prosecuted in JDR courts and you being on the bench in JDR courts, certain tools that are at your disposal that can be used to address situations involving domestic violence are critical and to ensuring that justice is ultimately served.

The use of bench war- rants, that is a critical tool for you, correct?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Correct.

Mr. CLINE.

Okay.


So we would want to ensure that that remains a tool for you and for prosecutors through any VAWA-funded pro- grams to continue to be a tool for you to use, correct?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

I am confused as to why it wouldn’t be a tool, be- cause whether I have the authority to issue a warrant is inherent in the court.

Mr. CLINE.

Correct.


But if—but prosecutors should also be able to maintain that option to seek a bench warrant if they are funded by VAWA programs, correct?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

I am sorry.

Congressman, I am not really sure what provisions you are talking about.

I have never seen a situa- tion in which a prosecutor would not be authorized to ask me for a search warrant—— Mr. CLINE.

Okay.

Ms. GONZALEZ [continuing].


Or an arrest warrant, but it still has to go through me where I find the probable cause to issue that war- rant.

Mr. CLINE.

Sure.

I will ask you also about housing programs.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Okay.

Mr. CLINE.

A lot of times, you have situations where people are in public housing programs or victims who need access to housing.

Some of the proposals would give victims of domestic violence pri- ority in line for transfer out of or to a different form of public hous- ing.
Do you think that that is an appropriate provision to include, to put them ahead of other victims that you might encounter?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

The difference here is that the choice for the vic- tim of domestic violence or sexual—in this case domestic violence, is to go home and get murdered or to find other housing, and some- times that decision is a critical one.

And so for this particular dy- namic where you have a family, a protector of children needing safe space, yeah, I think that is crucial.
I think—as I indicated in my testimony, the issue of trying to find housing is important.

I tell women all the time.

I am sorry, there is a no contact.

You can’t see him from last night.

And she says to me, Judge, how am I going to pay the rent?

How am I going to go to work?

I know you know what happened last night, but I need to work, and I need to go home.

I don’t have any place else to go, and I could lose my chil- dren if I am homeless.
So housing is a critical piece that has to be put in place to ad- dress those human needs.

Otherwise, she is going to go back and not do what I tell her to do.

Mr. CLINE.

In Wisconsin, do you have models of alternative jus- tice or restorative justice that are in place?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Mr. CLINE.

Okay.
Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Mr. CLINE.

Okay 101 Ms. GONZALEZ.

I work with the Criminal Justice Management Council in my own community, and my State is very trauma-in- formed and trauma-advised, and we look for alternatives in every way we can.

Mr. CLINE.
Mr. CLINE.

Do you require voluntary participation from both of- fender and victim before you refer a case to a situation like that, some type of mediation program?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

It is very, very important that the victim have a voice in those decisions, yes, sir.

Mr. CLINE.

Okay.

A voice, but not ultimately a veto?

Ms. GONZALEZ.


They can’t have necessarily a veto in those situa- tions because every case is different, and so the facts of that par- ticular—it is like, you know, we want to take a photograph of these people’s lives and say, okay, this is what happened, but their lives is a movie, and so we prefer to take a look at the full movie to de- cide what it is that is the best intervention for that family.

Mr. CLINE.

Thank you.

Ms. BASS.

Representative Jeffries.


Mr. JEFFRIES.

Thank you, Madam chair.

Ms. Valente, in your testimony, I believe you said that Native American and Alaskan Native women experience gender-based vio- lence at a staggeringly high rate.

Ms. VALENTE.

Yes.

Mr. JEFFRIES.

Is that right?

Ms. VALENTE.

It is actually Professor Deer who spoke to that.

Mr. JEFFRIES.

Oh, okay.

I am sorry.

Professor Deer.

Ms.

DEER.

Yes.

Mr. JEFFRIES.

Okay.


And you referenced a study that found over half of native women experience sexual violence in their lifetime.

Is that right?

Ms.

DEER.

That is correct.

Mr. JEFFRIES.

And I think you also mentioned that almost 15 percent experience sexual violence every year.

Is that right?

Fifteen percent of native women?

Ms.

DEER.


I am not sure if that is in my—in my testimony, but we do know that, according to the National Institute of Justice, 56 percent of native women will experience some form of sexual vio- lence.

That is more than one in two.

Mr. JEFFRIES.

And I think it is correct that approximately 95 percent of native women experiencing sexual violence or intimate partner violence will experience that violence by at least one non- native perpetrator?

Ms.

DEER.
Ms.

DEER.

That is also consistent with the National Institute of Justice research.

Mr. JEFFRIES.

And when we extended the Violence Against Women Act in 2013, we created for the first time a framework for Tribal courts to be able to prosecute non-native perpetrators.

Is that right?

Ms.

DEER.

Partly correct, sir.

The Tribal governments have been prosecuting non-Indians since we came into contact with non-Indi- ans.
It was in 1978 that the Supreme Court said we could no longer do so, and VAWA 2013 restored that jurisdiction but in that 102 narrow category of domestic dating and protection orders, not for child sexual abuse or sexual assault in general.

Mr. JEFFRIES.
Mr. JEFFRIES.

And in terms of the progress that was made in 2013, why was that important?

Ms.

DEER.

Well, because Tribal governments had—basically, had no options when they were faced with non-Indian batterers, non- Indian rapists, and for the first time in VAWA 2013, Congress took the invitation from the Supreme Court to correct the injustice that native women had been experiencing since 1978.

Mr. JEFFRIES.
Mr. JEFFRIES.

And can you elaborate on some of the sort of juris- dictional areas where we can expand in order to build upon the work that was done in 2013?

Ms.

DEER.

Certainly.

We are interested in—in expanding that ju- risdiction, restoring that jurisdiction to perpetrators of child abuse, to perpetrators of sexual violence which is outside the context of domestic violence, and to protect our Tribal law enforcement offi- cers as well.
And I can just give you an example again from a Tribe that was not able to take action in the case of sexual violence.

I need to find that real quick.

It was a Tribe in Arizona, and there was a groping.

Oh, here it is.

Sorry.

It was a Tribe in Arizona.

A female Tribal member who was em- ployed by the casino was fixing slot machines one evening when a group of drunk non-Indian patrons began harassing her.
And as the men were being removed by casino security, one of them grabbed the female employee by the genitals and squeezed.

And de- spite having the incident recorded on surveillance video, the Tribe was unable to charge the offender, who was a stranger to the vic- tim, because he was non-Indian.

Mr. JEFFRIES.

That is a very troubling example of why we need to expand jurisdiction here.

What is the counterargument that has been made as to why jurisdiction should be limited?

Ms.

DEER.
Ms.

DEER.

Well, I—I think, in part, the—the concern about Trib- al jurisdiction stems from, you know, just ignorance about the na- ture of Tribal courts, not understanding that Tribal courts operate much like State and Federal courts do.

I myself am the chief jus- tice of an appellate court for a Tribe in Minnesota.
We look at the same due process rights, in fact, sometimes giving more scrutiny because we are looking not just at the Tribal constitution, but also Federal civil rights statutes through the Indian Civil Rights Act, as well as what Violence Against Women Act requires in terms of ha- beas petitions.

So we are actually looking at kind of three layers of due process within that Tribal court system.

Mr. JEFFRIES.
Mr. JEFFRIES.

Am I correct that according to a 2018 report by the National Congress of American Indians that looked at the VAWA special jurisdictional court, it noted that not a single petition for habeas corpus had been filed in a 5-year period, suggesting that there had not been any overreach that had taken place?

Ms.

DEER.

That is correct.

From 2013 to 2018, the implementing Tribes reported making 143 arrests of 128 non-Indian abusers, leading to 74 convictions, 5 acquittals.
And right now as of 2018, there were 24 cases pending.
There has not been a single petition for habeas review brought in Federal court, and although some argue that Tribal courts would be incapable, right, of fairly imple- menting the jurisdiction in the absence of even a single habeas pe 103 tition in the first 5 years, reveals that those arguments were un- founded and likely based on prejudice alone.
And I would note that non-Indians have been acquitted by Tribal juries.

Mr. JEFFRIES.

Thank you.

I yield back.

Mrs. MCBATH [presiding].

The chair recognizes the gentleman from Florida, Mr. Steube.

Mr. STEUBE.

Thank you, Madam chair.

First, I would like to give some of my time to Ms. Beck.

You were going to respond to Mr. Cicilline when he interrupted Mrs. Lesko.

You were starting to respond, but you got cut off.

I just want to yield time to—to give to you to—to his response.

Ms. BECK.
Ms. BECK.

Thank you, Mr. Steube.

Could I—could you remind me what the context—— Mr. STEUBE.

Yeah.

Mrs. Lesko had a series of questions that she was asking—— Ms. BECK.

Right.

Mr. STEUBE [continuing].

And Mr. Cicilline had said something about that he—she used language regarding transgender—— Ms. BECK.

Right.

Mr. STEUBE [continuing].

That was offensive.

Could you—— Ms. BECK.

Sure.

Thank you.

Acknowledging biological sex is not inhumane.


It is actually inhumane to force women to share inti- mate spaces with male people who call themselves women.

So I don’t see any problem with calling someone male or female, man or woman, because these are words that refer to biological reality.

Gender itself, you know, femininity or masculinity, that is not im- portant.

Like I said, we need to acknowledge biological sex.

Doing so is not inhumane.


People whose—people who self-identify as transgender are human.

They are people, right?

But that doesn’t mean that I have to kowtow to their identity.

I can still call someone who identifies as a transgender woman a man because he is a man.

He is male.

And most men who call themselves transgender women retain their male genitals.

They pose a threat to women because male genitals can be weaponized.

Women are all vulnerable to forced impregna- tion.


That is just the facts of our biology.

So it is not inhumane to call someone according to their sex.

Mr. STEUBE.

Well, so where are all the—where is all of this lead- ing, in your view?

If we don’t ensure that the VAWA funds are re- served specifically for women, what are you worried will happen next?

Where will we be in 5 to 10 or 20 years from now?

Ms. BECK.
Ms. BECK.

If we cannot acknowledge biological sex or the dif- ferences of biological sex between the two sex classes, then there will be no protections for women on the basis of our biological sex.

Rates of violence against women I would expect to increase.

Rates of forced impregnation, forced motherhood, which is a form of slav- ery, that will also increase if we cannot name the problem of male violence against women.

And gender obfuscates this reality of bio- logical sex.

Mr. STEUBE.
Mr. STEUBE.

And what type of effect this shift may have on wom- en’s sports and Title IX, do you have any thoughts on that?

Ms. BECK.

Absolutely, I have a lot of thoughts on that.

Mr. STEUBE.

Well, you have got 2 minutes and 24 seconds to give it to us 104 Ms. BECK.

Thank you.
Thank you.

Yeah, women are losing titles and scholar- ships, collegiate opportunities because men who claim to be women, without any medical intervention whatsoever, are competing against female athletes.

I know in Connecticut there was a State track meet, and two biological male runners, two—two boys—I don’t—I wouldn’t say they are men, but they are boys.

They claimed to be girls.

They ran in the track meet, and they got first and second place.

We know that men are stronger, on average, than women.
We know that men are bigger, on average, than women, and this gives men an advantage over women if we are to compete together in the same track meet.

So two biological males actually stole scholastic opportunities from the—what would it be—the—the further and further down ranked female runners.

These girls are now lost— these girls have now lost the opportunity to go to college, because athletics is one main avenue of gaining—gaining an education in this community—in this country.
So, yes, Title IX is basically moot now because men can be women.

Mr. STEUBE.

So just to follow up on that, so if a biological man identified as a woman to run in this track meet, and then they can now qualify for those funds?

Ms. BECK.

Exactly.

And that is a problem.

Mr. STEUBE.

I will—do you have any more questions, Mrs. Lesko, because I will yield to you if you do.

Mrs. LESKO.

No.

Mr. STEUBE.

You are good?

All right.

I will yield to the chair.

Thank you much for your testimony.

Ms. BECK.


Thank you.

Mrs. MCBATH.

Thank you to the gentleman from Florida.

I would like—the chair would like to recognize herself for a mo- ment.

Thank you to each and every one of you this afternoon or this morning as you share your experiences with us and also your testi- monies.

And thank you for bearing with us as we work to reauthor- ize this very, very important legislation.

I would like to really start with some very deeply troubling facts.
According to an analysis of the FBI Supplementary Homicide Re- port by the Violence Policy Center, an average of 1.5 women every single day were murdered in 2015 as a result of being shot with a gun by a male intimate relation.

This constituted 35 percent of women murdered with a known cause of death and a known perpe- trator.

Another study found that the presence of a gun in a domestic vi- olence situation makes it five times more likely that a woman will be killed.
And I have to say that I have worked with many women who were victims of this type of gun violence and gun violence pre- vention advocacy.

We also know that abusers who use guns to threaten their victims, even—they use them even if they don’t in- tend to pull the trigger.

And while we often think of domestic vio- lence as something that happens behind closed doors, many mass shooters have a history of domestic violence or are motivated by a desire to harm a partner.
Taken together, guns in the hands of abusers is a serious threat to—to partners and to the community 105 Ms. Valente, I would like to ask you this question.

You know, more people are killed by abusive dating partners annually than by abusive spouses.
Federal law prohibits respondents to final protec- tive orders and domestic violence misdemeanants who are married or who were married to their victims from possessing firearms, yet it does not include the same protections for victims of dating abuse.

Why is that, and what can we do to fix this?

Ms. VALENTE.

I would like to thank you for asking that question.

This is important because it is an increasing population that we must deal with and we must protect.
I believe that this occurred because the original language around firearms prohibitors and do- mestic violence occurred in 1994 and 1996 when we really weren’t aware of this demographic and that this demographic would grow.

And I think that just like in many other parts of VAWA, as time goes by, we learn lessons.

We learn what we didn’t put in there properly in the first place.
We also learn that society changes, and we have to keep the law up to date with where society is going, and that is an increase in the number of dating partners who are exposed to this kind of firearms violence.

Mrs. MCBATH.

Thank you.

Let me ask you another question.

We know that 50 percent of people who experience stalking experi- ences, they experience some form of violence, and 20 percent of peo- ple who experience stalking experience threats with a weapon.
What can we do to better protect victims of stalking from gun vio- lence?

Ms. VALENTE.

That is another gap in our Federal firearms prohibitors.

Stalking is only addressed in a protection order context and only in the context of domestic violence, yet stalking can occur in other situations.

It may not be an intimate partner, and it may be something that is charged as a misdemeanor.
So right now, we have the same gap in the law that we had back when the Lautenberg Amendment passed, that you have coverage under the protection order, you have coverage through the felony prohibitor, and the misdemeanor crime charges and convictions that we—we know the bulk of them are being treated as are not covered at all.

We need to close that gap.

Stalking is the biggest red flag for lethality in domestic violence cases.

Research shows that.

Mrs. MCBATH.

Thank you so much.


Now the chair recognizes the gentleman from—recognizes the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. GOHMERT.

Thank you.

Julia Beck, I have said previously, based on my experience with African American very dear friends and employees, that there is probably nobody in America more beat up, figuratively speaking, than an African American conservative.

But seeing and hearing you, I see that that is now being rivaled.
I am amazed at people that would agree with you on much—on most things, I would have thought, have just taken you on as an enemy, whereas as a Chris- tian, we know that everybody is a gift, and whether we agree or disagree, we are all part of the same species.

Just at a very basic level, why would you say it is important— and I know you have touched on this, but we need to get to basics.

In a nutshell, why is it important to have women-only facilities?
106 Ms. BECK.

Thank you for your question.

I would like to say that I don’t think it is fair to compare the oppressions that Black people face with the oppressions that—that I face, because it is—it is not the same.

Mr. GOHMERT.

No, I understand.

Ms. BECK.


Thank you for acknowledging, but, you know, we all face some difficulties in life.

Mr. GOHMERT.

Well, some more than others.

There is no ques- tion.

Ms. BECK.

I think it is important to get back to the basics be- cause women-only space is crucial for women to survive in this world.

When I first experienced female space, I—it is hard to put into words what I felt.

I could stand tall.
I could stand tall.

I could walk at night without my shirt on and without fear of being raped or molested or, you know, taken—groped.

All of the things that I have to pro- tect myself from walking in Baltimore, I didn’t even have to worry about.

It wasn’t even on my mind.

And as a survivor of homeless- ness and of rape, I value female space because it allows me to be who I am without fear of molestation or—or violence.

So female space is crucial.


It is paramount to not only survival, but to healing from violence and abuse.

If one man, if one male person is in a space designated for female people, all of those women will start to censor themselves.

Women change what we do.

We change our behavior.

We change what we think and what we say because we fear male violence.

And I don’t know if other women in this room could relate to that, but it is true.
I think if the women in this room experience female space, you will realize, wow, this is really valuable because we can actu- ally be our full selves.

Mr. GOHMERT.

Well, as a former felony judge in Texas, I saw time and again women who have been victims of sexual assault.

So often you hear testimony from mental health folks.

They were so often traumatized to be in a closed environment with—with a man, whether the man thought he was a woman or a man.
It was—it sometimes brought back the whole trauma again and retrauma- tized the women.

And I have been amazed that with people on this committee, particularly who are normally so very sensitive to that kind of issue, how it doesn’t seem to be there on recognizing the need for some women-only spaces, and so I appreciate your bring- ing it to our attention.

I wanted to ask you about one other thing right quick.
In your opinion, should Federal grant purposes be modified to include the efforts to include combating female genital mutilation?

What do you think?

Ms. BECK.

Of course.

Yes.

There is no—there is no doubt about it.

It shouldn’t be a question.

Yes.

Mr. GOHMERT.

It sure seems like that is a form of abuse of women, and I am surprised that we have not reached out in that direction to help with grants to combat that kind of mutilation.
That sure seems like an early form of war on women, a war on girls at a very early age.

So I appreciate your candor here.

I know there are probably a lot of things we disagree on, but I can’t convey adequately how 107 much I appreciate you as a human being and your courage and your clarity.

Thank you very much.

Ms. BECK.


Thank you.

Mrs. MCBATH.

The chair would like to recognize the gentleman from Rhode Island.

Mr. CICILLINE.

Thank you, Madam chair, and thank you for con- vening this hearing.

For more than 20 years, the Violence Against Women Act has provided really critical protections for women who have experi- enced horrific violence, sexual assault, and stalking.
And it is very important, when you look at the services that are provided through VAWA, shelters and transitional housing, counseling, support serv- ices, this bill has the ability to really improve the lives of so many women and protect them against violence.

And given the importance of this, it is really unacceptable that VAWA was allowed to expire on December 21 when it became a casualty of the longest government shutdown in our Nation’s his- tory.
The victims and survivors of domestic violence can wait no longer, and I hope we will move quickly to reauthorize this.

Before I begin my questioning, I want to set the record straight with some facts.

Whether or not the minority witness believes that transgender people exist, it is a fact they do.

And despite her effort to decide the sexual orientation and gender identity of the entire is not her right.
In fact, population of our country, that transgender, gender nonconforming, and gender-fluid people are disproportionately survivors of violence.

They deserve to access services consistent with their needs.

And I would like to offer a few examples of the challenges that transgender Americans face.

According to a U.S. Transgender Survey which surveyed nearly 28,000 transgender adults, almost half of transgender individuals had been sexually assaulted in their lifetime.
According to the lat- est FBI statistics, more than 17 percent of all hate crimes reported in 2017 were based on the victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity.

Of 1,300 hate crime offenses based on sexual orientation, 118 of those incidents were exclusively antitransgender.

And fi- nally, the Human Rights Campaign found that at least 128 transgender individuals have been killed since 2013.

So those are the facts.


At the end of my questioning, I would like to ask unanimous con- sent to have a number of things put into the record.

I would like to begin my questioning with you, Judge Gonzalez.

You referenced this in response to Mr. Nadler’s questions, but I would like to kind of probe a little more deeply.

You made ref- erence in your testimony to Corrine and her 2-year-old child who had to jump through a number of hoops to find adequate housing and child care.
And I wonder if you could speak about the impact of the instability and lack of housing on survivors of violence and the kinds of examples you see in your courtroom, and what would the effect be if someone in Corrine’s situation would not be able to access VAWA grants that are available and potentially running out of funding because this law has expired.

Ms. GONZALEZ.
Ms. GONZALEZ.

We all know that where we live is important to us, but women who are fighting an issue of domestic violence, sometimes that is what is lost primarily.

Most of these—when we 108 talk about domestic violence, it is not just the violence; it is about the economic control and coercive control that is used.
So often they don’t have the resources that the—that the abuser has.

If they don’t have access to these vouchers—and, Congressman, even when they have access to the vouchers, it is not enough.

Because if we don’t have an opportunity for them to actually find a place that will take that voucher, they are not going anywhere.

I had a question yesterday.

Somebody said, why would somebody come to—to a prosecutor and say please don’t prosecute my abuser?

I will tell you why.


Because if they get prosecuted, then they may very well lose the housing that keeps them together.

These are issues that are very, very integral to making people safe, and it has to be looked at from the big picture and not just the small picture.

Mr. CICILLINE.

Thank you so much.

Ms. Valente, you made reference in your testimony, and the chair, chair McBath, questioned you about the presence of firearms in this very complicated set of situations.
You, in fact, made ref- erence in your testimony, and I quote you, to allow local law en- forcement to better protect their communities, the FBI should no- tify them when a domestic abuser attempts to purchase a firearm and fails the background check.

Great minds think alike.

I have a piece of legislation to do exactly that, and that will alert State and local law enforcement when a prohibited purchaser then tries to buy one.
Can you explain why you think this kind of alert is helpful in terms of protecting folks against violence, and what is the leading cause of homicide for victims of domestic and dating violence?

And could you tell us a little bit about when Congress added domestic violence prohibitions to the Federal firearm laws in 1994 and 1996, what was the kind of context of that?

I tried to get that all in be- cause you get to answer my question.

Ms. VALENTE.

I will do my best to do all of that.


First of all, the notification is tremendously important, because we do know that when a survivor reaches out, especially for a protection order, that is often the first time that they are reaching out to the system for help in a way that will really make the abuser aware that they are reaching out for help, and that can cause huge escalation in the vi- olence.
And so what we see, not uncommonly, is that an abuser will go out and attempt to purchase a firearm after the issuance of a protection order or after that first intervention.

And so letting law enforcement—local law enforcement know that that escalation is starting to occur is very important.
I think if you talk to any local law enforcement officer, they will tell you, yeah, we know that there are certain families that are struggling with certain issues, and they try to keep an eye out for what is going on, trying to keep the family safe.

And any piece of informa- tion that helps to keep them safe and law enforcement safe, be- cause law enforcement, you know, deaths are very high in relation to answering domestic violence calls.

Mr. CICILLINE.

Thank you.


Madam chairman, a unanimous consent request?

I ask unani- mous consent that the report of the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey be made a part of the record.
The unanimous consent request that a report of the National Consensus Statement of Antisexual As 109 sault and Domestic Violence Organizations in Full Support of Equal Access for the Transgender Community be part of the record; an article entitled More Than 250 Sexual Assault Domestic Vio- lence Organizations Condemn Anti-Trans Legislation be part of the record; an article from the University of California UCLA School of Law, The Williams Institute, The Public Regulation of Gender and its Impact on Transgender People’s Lives; the Uniform Crime Sta- tistics Hate Crime Statistics Report from the Federal Bureau of In- vestigation for 2017; and finally, an article from Springer entitled Gender Identity Nondiscrimination Laws in Public Accommoda- tions all be made a permanent part of the record.
Mrs. MCBATH.

Without objection.
[The information follows:] MR. CICILLINE FOR THE OFFICIAL RECORD .
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182 Mrs. MCBATH.

The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Louisiana.

Mr. RICHMOND.

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

Judge, and I know that in your testimony you mentioned a case, and I want to mention a case, and I would like to know how it would be handled today.
It was actually my first case out of law school, which was a child in need of care case where they actually terminated the parental rights for a young lady to her four chil- dren.

In the facts of the case, the boyfriend, the live-in boyfriend, was an abuser.

He abused her and he severely injured one of the chil- dren with abusive whipping.

The State then filed to terminate her parental rights.

And ultimately, the State won, I lost, and they ter- minated her parental rights.

Now, she didn’t go to jail.


She didn’t get convicted of a crime, but she lost her four children.

And the only partially good thing was that the family that was going to take them would allow her to try to maintain a relationship with them.

But when we start talking about terminating a mother’s right to raise her children, how would that case happen today?

How would that case be resolved today?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Congressman, thank you for the question.


It real- ly comes down to what was said before was, hey, if you can’t keep your kids safe, then you don’t get to keep your kids.

And so they— there was a mentality then, right, that the violence in the home was her fault, that it was her responsibility to protect her children.

Without understanding the entire movie, as I have indicated be- fore, we were looking at a photograph of this family instead of the full movie of that family.
That changes today because I have trained social workers that understand the dynamics of domestic violence, I have prosecutors that understand the dynamics, and I have law enforcement who make that initial call to understand and look behind what is really happening here.

[Audience disruption.]

Mr. LIEU [presiding].

Could we have some order, please?

Thank you.

Thank you.

We got it.

Appreciate it.

We need to con- tinue the hearing.


So if you could please escort her out of the room kindly, that would be great.

Thank you.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Congressman, I have that passion in my court- room all the time.

Mr. RICHMOND.

And I will just tell you that I felt the exact same way that she did when I lost that case and those rights were termi- nated.

The case subsequently went up to the Supreme Court and so on.
What about CASA and their positions and their evolution, or has there been an evolution with CASA to understand the dynamics of—— Ms. GONZALEZ.

Absolutely.

What—what happens with—with VAWA is it just turned things into a different perspective.

It—once you have a judge that is trained using those VAWA funds to under- stand the importance of this dynamic, they come back.

They bring everybody to the table.

They bring CASA.

They bring the pros- ecutor.


They bring their community resources to say this cannot be 183 the way we do this, because all we are doing is traumatizing chil- dren.

Those children whose parental rights were terminated, they are going to try and go back to that biological family anyway.
They are going to find their home, and we—we have not done what we need- ed to do for them because we, the system, made ourselves feel bet- ter.

It is better if that mother doesn’t have these kids.

We don’t have to worry about this family anymore.

That is not the solution.

The solution is how do we make that mom and those kids have a healthy, happy relationship together?
And by the way, that dad who was involved in that violence, there is—there is and there needs to be a pact for parents and fa- thers to—to parent after violence.

And that has been a change that has come across over the last 24 years, and that has come across because of VAWA.

Mr. RICHMOND.

Yeah.

And I—but let’s make the point that, yeah, I do want the biological father back involved, but there should be some real steps before.

Let me ask another question.

Anybody can answer this.


Also while I was in law school, I intervened in a situation and called a domestic violence hotline that no one answered.

So my question to anybody who can answer it, what is your experience with these hotlines?

Are they underfunded?

Because what it does is put out there a false sense of hope, and then when you call it and no one answers, then all of a sudden, the person is in a worse place than where we began.
And by the way, the husband was taken away, and the police did not arrest him because she didn’t want to press charges, on a Friday, because she didn’t want him to stay on the weekend.

He came back Sunday night and killed her Monday morning.

So that is why these hotlines are important and emergency shel- ter and those things.

So just tell me about the hotline.

I think my time has expired, but if you could tell me about the hotline, it would be important.

Ms. VALENTE.

You raise an important point.


Everyone who reaches out to a hotline should be able to receive services and a re- sponse, and we need the funding to make sure that that will hap- pen.

You also answered your question in what you stated.

It is very difficult to raise private funding for services like this.

It is an over- whelming amount of funding.

We really do believe that the govern- ment has a responsibility to support, you know, national hotlines, State-level hotlines, local ones.
People make different choices about where they are going to reach out, and we want to have all of those resources available.

They are all chronically underfunded.

Mr. RICHMOND.

Mr. Chairman, if I just could have 15 seconds.

Mr. LIEU.

Go ahead.

Mr. RICHMOND.

I would like to add that there is a lot of hope for me in this conversation.
I had an elderly Black couple in New Orle- ans that took their life savings and started their own emergency shelter for women who are—who need emergency shelter because of domestic violence, an elderly couple, because they wanted to make sure that people are addressing this issue.
And I support them every way and with every dollar that I can, but it shows that 184 we are turning a corner, but the government has to put our money where our mouth is also.

So thank you all.

And thank you, Mr. Chairman, for that extra 15 seconds.

Mr. LIEU.

Thank you.

The Chair recognizes himself for 5 minutes.


Let me start by saying I have an important announcement.

It is day 20 of the declaration of national emergency.

The President of the United States has told us we are in a national emergency.

Do you feel it?

Can you feel it?

No.

But what is a real emergency is the epidemic of domestic violence across America and all its attend- ant consequences, including death, injury, homelessness.
I would like to spend the next few moments talking about the connection between domestic violence and homelessness.

In Los Angeles County, in my district in Los Angeles County, one of the biggest issues I hear about is homelessness, and for several years, a number of people experiencing homelessness has grown, and part of this is connected to domestic violence.

In 2018, nearly 53,000 people were experiencing homelessness in L.A. County, 16,000 of whom were women.
And then according to the data looking at the L.A. County continuum of care area, nearly half of women who ex- perienced homelessness reported that they also experienced domes- tic violence.

According to the National Network to End Domestic Violence, in 2015, 7,728 adults and children fleeing domestic violence sought refuge in an emergency shelter or transitional housing program, but their needs went unmet.

So my question is to Ms. Valente.


In your written testimony, you noted that domestic violence is a leading cause of family homeless- ness.

You also mentioned that VAWA programs that provide hous- ing support for domestic violence survivors exist but that gaps re- main.

Could you please elaborate a little bit on what steps you can take to ensure domestic violence survivors do not experience home- lessness?

Ms. VALENTE.

Yes.
Ms. VALENTE.

Yes.

And I also want to acknowledge at this point that the National Network to End Domestic Violence does have a representative here, and at the end of the hearing, I know that their expertise would be very valuable to you, and I would be happy to make sure that you speak with them.

They have a lot of information on housing.

Mr. LIEU.

Thank you.

Ms. VALENTE.

Housing is one of the number one concerns.

I think Judge Gonzalez made reference to that earlier.
Without secure housing, many survivors are going to return.

Many survivors go into shelter, which have limits of 30 to 90 days of staying so that others may use it, and many return home to the place where the violence occurred.

What we need are more housing vouchers.

We need more of an ability for survivors to be able to have financial supports so that they—one of the biggest problems that people tell us is they can’t get the first month’s rent, last month’s rent, security deposit put together.
Funding that allows that.

Many survivors have jobs.

They just have to be able to get into housing.

So some of the things that we are talking about are addressing those needs.
185 We also know that there are many survivors who are evicted from housing, public housing and private housing, because of the crimes that the abuser commits.

And so they as victims must suffer the same punishment, which means that they are thrown out of the housing as well.

We need to keep that from happening.


And those are the sorts of protections that we are talking about.

Mr. LIEU.

Thank you.

I want to say that when I was on the Cali- fornia State Legislature, I passed a law that allowed victims of do- mestic violence to break their leases with their landlords so that they could stay and not have to move out.

Now, I also—I am sorry—so they could move out and not have to stay.

So my next question is to Judge Gonzalez.


In your written testi- mony, you discussed the impact of evictions on the ability of domes- tic violence survivors to find housing using vouchers.

Are there pro- tections for domestic violence survivors to prevent them from being evicted if their abuser is involved in criminal activities?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

No.

No.

We don’t have any protections for them to not be evicted.

It is basically a private contract between the landlord and the—and the tenant.
In the—my example that I used in my written testimony, there is a dual lease, and the victim of domestic violence leaves to go get a protective order.

So she goes temporarily into shelter, and while she is gone, there is an eviction because of the criminal behavior in the household, and the abuser goes and says, sure, go ahead, evict me.
But by the time we get to that writ of eviction, it is the victim who is being served with that writ of eviction by the sheriff, and at this point, it is very dif- ficult for her to go back and try and get that eviction reversed.

Mr. LIEU.

Thank you.

And, Ms. Valente, do you have any additional comments on that?

Great.

Thank you.

Okay.

So I am going to yield back, and the next person we have is Mr. Cohen for 5 minutes.

Mr. COHEN.

Thank you, Mr.


Chair, and thank you for all the panelists and the people who attended this hearing.

This is so important that we reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act, and I support the amendments and the changes that have been made in this legislation because violence against people, in addition to women, should also be against the law, and there should be protections, and there should be sanctuaries.

And we are, as President Obama said many times, becoming a more perfect union.
This is part of the way we are is by recognizing other in- stances of abuse and going forward.

And I hope my Republican col- leagues will come into the 21st century with us and support this new law and show that they are serious about protecting people.

Otherwise, I would like to ask Ms. Valente a question.

Our Na- tion has had a serious problem with processing rape kits in a time- ly manner.
A few years ago, Memphis was, unfortunately, ground zero for the rape kit backlog, and when the rape kits go untested, the victims are without justice and perpetrators are on the streets to commit additional acts because they haven’t been—seen justice meted upon them and have them taken out of society where they can now commit more crimes.
With the help of Federal funding, and I have to say that we were successful in getting that Federal funding on several occasions with 186 Republican help during the appropriations process, which often- times are bipartisan, and I had the privilege of having, I think, first Mr. Wolf and then later another Republican help me with that funding.
We made progress adding funds to decrease that backlog.

As of January 2019, there were 40—give or take, 4,500 DNA pro- files from 4,600 sexual assault kits that had been entered into the FBI’s combined DNA analysis system known as CODIS.
These pro- files have resulted in CODIS hits to almost 1,600 known convicted offenders and 371 known arrests, so it is shown the ability to find the perpetrators of these crimes, bring them to justice, and then protect, because these are oftentimes repeat offenses and they are serial offenders.

In Memphis, we have had 3,526 investigations have been initi- ated; 3,140 investigations have been closed; 403 requests for indict- ments have been issued; and 87 cases have been prosecuted.
In 2013, version—the 2013 version of Violence Against Women, the VAWA Act, required that a minimum of 75 percent of Debbie Smith grants be used to carry out DNA analysis of samples from crime scenes for inclusion in CODIS and increase the capacity of State and local government laboratories to carry out DNA analysis.

DNA analysis is vitally important to Memphis and to other cities throughout this country.
But I was hoping that you, Ms. Valente, could shed some light on why it is so important for our national efforts to address sexual assault and how these rape kit testing procedures are important in fighting sexual assaults.

Ms. VALENTE.

So I am going to preface this by saying something similar to what I said about housing.
We have an expert behind us from the National Alliance to End Sexual Violence, and I would love to be able to connect them with—after the hearing, because they can provide so much more information.

But the rape kit backlog is a very important piece.

VAWA has played a very important role in—in making that increase occur.
There have been pilot programs under VAWA that have really gone into communities and examined better ways of making sure that that backlog is—is taken care of, that in the future we don’t build up a similar backlog.

And while I am at it, I am going to make a shameless plug for sexual assault services, because while they are authorized in VAWA, they are not authorized at the same levels as some of the other services, and they can certainly—we need that support.

We need those programs to be expanded.


We need rape prevention and education to be expanded because then we won’t even need rape kit backlogs programs.

What we are really looking at is getting youth, children and youth, to really understand healthy relationships, to understand consent, to understand how not to commit these crimes in the fu- ture, to respect the dignity of others.

That is a piece of VAWA that was cut in the last reauthorization.
We are still not quite sure why, and we would love to see that funding not just restored, but in- creased.

It is a program that goes out to all of the states.

It is seri- ously underfunded.

The authorization level, we hope, could be raised to $150 million to give every State and territory access to that important program.
187 Mr. COHEN.

Thank you very much.

In my last seconds before I have gone over, I just want to give credit to Senator—former Sen- ator Joe Biden, who was the original sponsor of this.

He wasn’t al- ways perfect on women’s issues back in the day, but he was cer- tainly right on this one.

Ms. VALENTE.

Absolutely.

Mr. COHEN.


And Louise Slaughter, who was the House sponsor and deceased, but was a great Member, and I think Steny Hoyer had something to do with it.

He certainly talks about it a lot.

Ms. VALENTE.

Yes.

Mr. COHEN.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Ms. DEAN [presiding].

The chair recognizes the gentlewoman from Florida for 5 minutes, Ms. Mucarsel-Powell.

Ms. MUCARSEL-POWELL.

Thank you, Madam chair.


I am sure that others have already emphasized this point, but I want to reit- erate how important VAWA is, working with victims, their fami- lies, dealing with the impact of violence in their lives, providing the resources necessary for law enforcement, education, educating com- munities, preventing crimes.

I come from a family of women.

I am the youngest of four sisters.

We have about 15 women in my family, between nieces and sisters and parents, mothers.
And I think that most women can actually attest to always being in that fine line of having relationships where if the line is crossed, you can be in an extremely dangerous situation.

So that is why VAWA—reauthorizing VAWA is critical.

Between 2013 and 2015, the Department of Justice estimates that VAWA programs provided over 1 million services to victims across the Nation.

In Florida alone, nearly 16,000 individuals re- ceived emergency shelter at a domestic-violence center just last year.
And nearly 40,000 men, women, and children received out- reach services relating to domestic violence.

Thanks to the 2013 reauthorization, VAWA was—has advocated for victims in the LGBTQ community and made efforts to help Na- tive Americans and—on their Tribal reservations.

I would like to start from looking at some of the past testimony.

I wanted to start asking this question from Ms. VALENTE.

Does the NTF have con- cerns about Title 9 being undermined by the Department of Edu- cation?

Ms. VALENTE.
Ms. VALENTE.

Yes.

And again, I am not the expert on this par- ticular issue, but we have—we have been closely watching.

We have submitted comments on this.

All of our member organizations have.

The Obama administration’s guidance on Title 9 was very, very helpful, and really made a sea change.

We are concerned about a successful series of protocols and guidances being under- mined, or undone.

And so we do want to see those protections.

Ms. MUCARSEL-POWELL.


And are your concerns connected to the attempts to weaken the protections and civil rights for campus-vio- lence survivors?

Ms. VALENTE.

That is a large portion of our concern.

A lot of what goes on is—it is important for universities to take a very strong and—and powerful stance against these crimes.

And to also make it clear to folks that these crimes are occurring when they do, that they report them appropriately, that they respond, that they change their protocols.
We want to see that continue.

We don’ 188 want to see—go back to the days where no one did report these crimes on campus, because there was no good outcome, other than the victim possibly being expelled, or having to leave—not expelled, but having to leave the campus because no supports were being given.

Ms. MUCARSEL-POWELL.


And do you think it is critical for us to include in the resources that we allocate for some of these edu- cational programs, to be directed specifically to on-campus, sexual assault education programs?

Ms. VALENTE.

We have programs that will do that work.

And you know, fully—you know, authorizing healthy amounts for these pro- grams in VAWA, are going to really have an impact on that.

We have requests that we have put in for those numbers, and again, we have experts behind me.
I feel—I worry about committing mal- practice at times, because this is not my particular—I don’t have the numbers right before me.

But I do know that we have asked for support for these programs, that we need more work being done in that arena.

Ms. MUCARSEL-POWELL.

Thank you, Ms. VALENTE.


And a quick question to Judge Gonzalez—thank you for being here—can you talk about a little bit how VAWA has helped your work with law enforcement on cases involving domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking?

Ms. GONZALEZ.

Okay.


I have had the opportunity, because of the funding from VAWA, to be in the room with law enforcement judges from all over the country, where we come together and we learn from each other about what it is that needs to happen, in order for both of us to hear what the other one is saying, so that we are talking in the same language, so that victims understand that we are not—we all understand our parts, right?
But we are working together to make the community safer and to make them safer.

We are not enemies in this fight.

We are—we are com- patriots, and I think it works—without that funding, I think it is a little harder to do that job.

Ms. MUCARSEL-POWELL.

Thank you, Judge.

I yield back my time.

Ms. DEAN.

The chair now recognizes myself for 5 minutes.

I am Madeleine DEAN.


from Pennsylvania, and I am pleased for this op- portunity to speak with all of you today on the reauthorization of this historic piece of legislation.

VAWA provides vital resources to support victims, hold offenders accountable, and keep communities safer.

Domestic violence is an insidious problem that affects far too many people across this coun- try.
As the statistics reveal, one in four women, one in seven men, will be the victim of violence by an intimate partner in his or her lifetime.

Each reauthorization of VAWA has made important improve- ments leading to tangible results.

Between 1994 at its inception, as written by Vice President Biden, and 2012, the rate of domestic vi- olence decreased by 63 percent.

From 1996 to 2015, the rate of women murdered by a man in single-victim, single-offender inci- dents dropped by 29 percent.
The most critical factor enabling a victim of domestic violence to escape further abuse is the ability to obtain physical separation, as 189 you all well know.

While in the Pennsylvania State House, I cared deeply about this issue and supported different pieces of legislation and authored some.

So I will throw this out to you.


I am going to give you three areas of interest where you could give us some guidance on how we can strengthen, in the reauthor- ization, VAWA.

And if you might, I will throw them at you.

I apolo- gize, it is large, our time is limited.

But in the area of gun violence, how is it that we could—you saw that last week, we passed two im- portant gun bills, one to close the Charleston loophole and one to expand background checks, to make them more universal.
So in terms of gun violence and domestic violence, how can we strengthen that issue within VAWA?

In terms of housing, as a member of the Pennsylvania legislature, I authored legislation that I was never able to pass, to allow victims of domestic violence, ei- ther a lock change or early termination of a lease.

What could we do under VAWA in terms of housing help?
And also, I am a member of the Pennsylvania Commission for Women, and under Governor Wolf’s tenure, he and we put together a package of bills to try to get at the scourge of domestic violence on college campuses.

The bill that I authored had to do with am- nesty for a good samaritan or somebody reporting domestic vio- lence.

So having used half of my time, I would like to throw it back to you and—and end with this—well, I will throw it back to you.

Housing, gun violence, and sexual assault on campuses.
How can we make this bill stronger?

Ms. VALENTE.

Well, as you might guess, I am happy to take the gun-violence question.

The things that we really need are that dat- ing-violence prohibitor, because we have 50 percent of domestic vio- lence—victims who are reaching—who are experiencing domestic or dating violence who are not covered under current law.
And that means that the same terrible acts can happen, the same physical violence, but if you are married, formerly married, cohabiting, for- merly cohabiting, or have a child in common, you will get that pro- tection.

And if you are dating, and do not fit any of those cat- egories, you do not get that protection.

It simply doesn’t make any sense.

Similarly, adding the stalking prohibitor, because we know of the lethality of stalking.
Stalking is the greatest red flag in the domes- tic-violence arena, of escalating violence and lethality.

Ms. DEAN.

Thank you.

On housing, sexual assault on campuses?

Ms. BECK.

I will be quick.

About college domestic violence, I know a lot of colleges, universities, schools, are—they are insti- tuting gender-neutral spaces which actually mean mixed-sex spaces.
You, yourself, just said that it is important for victims, or potential victims, to be physically separate from their attacker or their potential abuser.

So gender-neutral spaces on colleges and universities actually put in danger women who are trying to escape from male abusers.

Ms. DEAN.

Thank you.

Ms. GONZALEZ.

I would like to speak to the housing issue.

I think I probably seem like a broken record so far.
But being able to have some protection so that you are not evicted from your residence be- cause there has been a crime that has been committed, and having 190 more access to vouchers is great.
But if I can’t find a landlord who is going to look beyond the domestic violence, beyond the previous eviction for what happened, then we are still not going to find that housing.

Ms. DEAN.

I appreciate that.

Thank you all for your important testimony today, and I want to just end on this note.

It is a quote by Joe Biden, just recently.


He was the father of this legislation 25 years ago, and he says, and I quote, ‘‘When I wrote the Violence Against Women Act in 1994, I believed it would be a lifeline, but this Congress has turned it into a political football.

It is time to pass a strong reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.

No more stalling.

Lives are on the line.’’ I couldn’t agree more.

I would like to recognize Mrs. McBath for 5 minutes.

Mrs. MCBATH.

Thank you so much.


I just have one more question.

And I wanted to ask both Judge Gonzalez and Ms. Valente: How can we ensure that the Violence Against Women Act is effective in protecting members of the LGBTQ community who have been experiencing domestic violence at similar rates that we have heard today, and sometimes higher rates than heterosexual women, and what role do judges and pol- icymakers have to ensure inclusiveness?

Ms. VALENTE.
Ms. VALENTE.

I am happy to start with what—some of goes on in the requests in the 2013 VAWA, just to explain the history of why we ask for these provisions.

And that is, with each VAWA, we realize more and more that survivors need gateways to get to help.

Survivors rarely call the police first.

You know, only in cases of ex- treme physical violence is that going to be the first response.

Peo- ple will go to their faith communities.


They will go to other kinds of organizations for which they feel an affiliation, and they are going to be seeking help there.

They will go to medical offices and hospitals, seeking help.

And so what we have tried to do in VAWA is be really aware and make sure that we provide funding and support for those programs that are existing outside of the traditional shelter context.
In some cases, that was the LGBT programs, which could not have received funding before, as other population-specific programs may not have been able to do, like programs that work with immigrants.

Yet that is the place where somebody’s going to go and ask for help.

So VAWA added that, in that spirit of understanding that certain pop- ulations will want to go to certain gateways, and that we need to provide that in there.

Mrs. MCBATH.

Thank you.

Ms. GONZALEZ.


You know, it is unfortunate that we decided to make this a women issue, because this is a humanity issue.

When we talk about LGBTQ families, we are talking about individuals who are living their lives just like everybody else—in loving rela- tionships that they want to keep.

But the violence interferes with that relationship, and what they want is the violence to stop.
It is hard enough when you are living in a—what seems to be a nor- mative relationship with everybody else, that you are in a man- woman relationship, but it is still hard to come forward and say that there is violence in your house.
191 But when it is two men, or when it is two women, or when it is something that is outside of the norm, and perhaps not recog- nized by a majority of who you associate with, it becomes even harder.

VAWA needs to grow.

VAWA needs to be inclusive.

And VAWA needs to include all, if the violence is going to stop.
Because unless we do that, then children will be traumatized, communities are not going to be safe, and when law enforcement goes to the door, they are still going to be more at risk than any other time for any other call.

Ms. DEAN.

The additional time of the gentlelady has expired, but I wanted to make sure, Ms. Beck, did you want to respond?

Ms.

DEER.

Can I?

Ms. DEAN.

Yes, Professor.

Ms.

DEER.

In many of our Tribal communities, we have what we call two-spirit people, who are LGBTQ people.
Two-spirit people traditionally have been held in very high regard by many of our Tribal societies, and—and are in some places spiritual leaders and healers of the community.

And so I would certainly be interested in a Violence Against Women Act that continues to honor the role of our two-spirit relatives.

Thank you.

Ms. DEAN.

Thank you, everyone.

This concludes today’s hearing.

Thank you to our distinguished witnesses for attending.
Without objection, all members will have five legislative days to submit additional, written questions for the witnesses or additional materials for the record.

The hearing is adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 12:23 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
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