Norton to Offer Amendment to Stop Republicans from Permanently Stripping D.C. Women of Rights

Norton to Offer an Amendment Today to Stop Republicans from Permanently Stripping Low-Income D.C. Women of Their Reproductive Rights

May 2, 2011

WASHINGTON, DC - Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) will offer an amendment today at 5:00 p.m. in room H-313 of the Capitol during the Rules Committee meeting on H.R. 3, the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, to amend section 309 of the bill, the "Application to District of Columbia," which would permanently ban the District from spending its local tax dollars on abortion services for low-income women. Norton said, "The D.C. provision in this bill seeking to make permanent a rider, that, like all such riders, must be voted annually in appropriation bills, and is among the most radical anti-home-rule attacks in the District's history. After successful struggle that removed all anti-home rule riders during the last four years, Republicans passed a new ban on the city's use of local funds for abortions for low-income women in the 2011 continuing resolution. H.R. 3 goes further, demonstrating how far Republicans are prepared to push their anti-home rule campaign if Democrats and our city stand for it."

This will be Norton's fifth time before the Rules Committee this Congress, but she warned its members to "expect on seeing me at your meetings each time you entertain proposals that treat the American citizens I represent as unequal to the citizens you represent." In February, she was denied the opportunity to testify on the D.C. abortion provision during the House Judiciary Subcommittee hearing of H.R. 3, which the Congresswoman also opposes in its entirety because of its wholesale attack on women's reproductive rights.

Norton said in her Rules Committee statement, "The District of Columbia was recently sacrificed in H.R. 1473, the Department of Defense and Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act, 2011, and is now prohibited from spending its local funds on abortions for poor women for the remainder of this fiscal year. H.R. 3 seeks to pile on the District and make that ban permanent. The provision, affecting only the local funds of the District of Columbia, amounts to a taking of local funds by unaccountable Members of Congress. Because Section 309 only concerns local funds, it is unrelated to the federal policy purposes of the bill, and crosses the line into autocracy by dictating to the District of Columbia that it may never again spend its own local-taxpayer-raised funds on abortions for low-income women."

The Congresswoman full committee testimony follows.

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Statement of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton on H.R. 3, the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act

I appreciate the opportunity to testify here today, particularly since I was denied the opportunity to testify by the Subcommittee on the Constitution, House Judiciary Committee, during its hearing on H.R. 3, the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, despite the fact that the bill contains a provision that uniquely affects my district. I am back before your Committee for the fifth time this Congress. Count on seeing me each time the Committee entertains proposals that treat the American citizens I represent as unequal to the citizens you represent.

I strongly oppose this harsh anti-choice bill in its entirety because it seeks to keep women from exercising their constitutional rights to reproductive choice and to make it virtually impossible for them to buy health insurance to exercise that option. However, I am here today to particularly discuss an unprecedented provision in the bill, Section 309, "Application to District of Columbia." The District of Columbia was recently sacrificed in H.R. 1473, the Department of Defense and Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act, 2011, and is now prohibited from spending its local funds on abortions for poor women for the remainder of this fiscal year. H.R. 3 seeks to pile on the District and make that ban permanent. The provision, affecting only the local funds of the District of Columbia, amounts to a taking of local funds by unaccountable Members of Congress. Because Section 309 only concerns local funds, it is unrelated to the federal policy purposes of the bill, and crosses the line into autocracy by dictating to the District of Columbia that it may never again spend its own local-taxpayer-raised funds on abortions for low-income women. To accomplish this purpose, the bill compounds the insult by federalizing the District of Columbia for the purposes of abortion. Section 309(2) states that the "term ‘Federal Government' includes the government of the District of Columbia." Deeming the District to be part of the federal government for the purposes of abortion is an unprecedented violation of the District's right to self-government. No one can deem away the District's citizenship rights.

I remind the Committee that the District of Columbia is not a federal colony to be toyed with whenever a Member wants to indulge his or her ideological preferences. This city was granted home rule in 1973, after more than 170 years of the shameful denial of any democracy -a nation's capital without a local executive or a legislative body, ruled by Congress through three overseers known as commissioners. Having embraced self-government as a bedrock principle for the District of Columbia, Congress has no right to toss aside the District's right to govern itself and spend its own funds at the whim of any Member or group of Members.