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Republican Fraud, Libel, and Falsification of Documents in the Judiciary Committee

Submitted by Zed on Wed, 2005-04-27 21:16.

Congresswoman Louise Slaughter (D-NY) reported today an absolutely astounding incident in the house judiciary committee. Republican members of that committee took the summaries of the amendments proposed by the Democrats on the committee and rewrote them, replacing them with false summaries that were politically damaging.

Quoting Louise Slaughter:
At least five amendments to this bill, which were designed to protect the rights of family members and innocent bystanders from prosecution under this bill, were rewritten as amendments designed to protect sexual predators from prosecution and were then included in the committee report as if that was the original intent of the authors. The thing is, sexual predators were not mentioned anywhere in any of these amendments.

More amazing, the chairman (F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr., R-WI) told her up front that it was deliberate, and when she moved to have the fraudulent entries replaced with the originals, it was voted down along party lines. I am absolutely aghast that this sort of thing is even legal. Somewhere along the line, there has to be a rule about falsification of documents, somewhere, right? I find myself wondering if the recently fixed House Ethics Committee will be able to look into this.

Daily Kos has the full text and a video of her speech on the floor, describing what happened, and the story has also been picked up by Feministe and Rox Populi, which are hosting some additional comments on the matter, as well as Michael Hussey, who pointed out that this is not the first time the GOP has tried rewriting a bill after a vote.

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Signed Michael Hussey

Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 2005-04-27 22:56.

Signed Michael Hussey

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Thanks for the hat tip. Mi

Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 2005-04-27 22:58.

Thanks for the hat tip.

Michael Hussey

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Exact changes now available

Submitted by Zed on Fri, 2005-04-29 18:01.

The Raw Story has now posted the complete list of changes, along with a rather apt description by Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY):

Quoting Jerrold Nadler:
This is truly outrageous, and a gross abuse of power. The authors of this report suggest that they described my amendment in accordance with its possible effect, but if that’s true, consider this:

Under CIANA, a father who rapes and impregnates his own daughter can go and sue the doctor or the grandparent or the clergyman who transported his child across state lines for the purpose of getting an abortion. Maybe that wasn’t exactly the intent of this legislation. But according to the descriptive guidelines now laid out by the majority, it would therefore be fair to call this entire bill the Rapists and Sexual Predators Right to Sue Act.

The Republicans are trying to determine which words the Democrats get to use to describe their own amendments. What next – they get to write our speeches?

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