Amanda Terkel On MSNBC: How Violence Against Women Act Became Partisan Issue

Protecting women from domestic violence and abuse is one more issue dividing Democrats and Republicans, as The Huffington Post's Amanda Terkel pointed out in a recent story. Terkel appeared on MSNBC Thursday to discuss how the Violence Against Women Act, which has been reauthorized twice with overwhelming bipartisan support since President Clinton signed it in 1994, received no GOP support in the Senate Judiciary Committee this time around.

"Only Democrats, no Republicans supported it," she said. "This is clearly just showing what a partisan Congress this is and how far apart both sides are. Even this legislation is partisan."

MSNBC host Tamron Hall asked Terkel about Republican objections, which include protections for undocumented immigrants who are victims of domestic abuse -- a provision Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) said could lead to "a pathway to U.S. citizenship for foreign con artists and criminals."

"People aren't getting special treatment," Terkel said. "It says you just can't discriminate against anyone if they happen to be gay, lesbian, transgender and a number of undocumented women who get to stay in the country if they're victims of these crimes. It's a pretty small jump, from 10,000 to 15,000 visas. And these aren't new visas, they're just ones that haven't been used in the past."

Read Terkel's piece here.

Comments

[BiologistTim]

08:26 AM on 02/25/2012

I'm fairly liberal and think there are good things in the VAWA, but the provision allowing visas and citizenship to abuse victims is misused. The act creates an incentive to make false claims of abuse. When men are falsely accused of abuse they are put through a legal process that is heavily biased against them. Even if found innocent, the man, in the process, often looses thousands of dollars, is often evicted from his home, and must live with the social stigma of being accused of a heinous act. Not to mention what his employer may think of all the lost work this causes. Don't know how common this is, but there are many reports of it, and it has happened to someone I know personally.

The act is applicable to both men and women, but the title still only includes "women". It is clear congress is aware that their is bias in enforcement since they felt the need to prevent discrimination against the LGBT community. I suspect that transgendered individuals are often discriminated against not because of their transgendered status, but because they are treated as men instead of women. It needs more provisions to protect against sex bias.

I totally agree that something needs to be done to protect non-citizens coming forward with abuse claims, but I'm not sure this is the best way to go about it.

[laird]

01:14 AM on 02/21/2012

So it passed with overwhelming bipartisan support three times, under both Clinton and Bush, and _now_ it's suddenly a partisan bill? Sure....

[ReformedRepublican]

11:26 AM on 02/17/2012

The Republican Party has truly become the Party of knee jerk response to ANYTHING this President or the Democrats propose, support, or sponsor. It is so automatic that John Boehner had to hold a press conference to say that even though the Republicans were supporting the social security tax reductions extension bill, they felt it would not help anything. Really? You voted for a bill that does NOTHING. If it does nothing, why not NOT vote for it? Oh, that is right. They had to vote for it so the Democrats could not make their complete disregard for the middle class of this country a political issue in an election year and would have the simplest example to point to as evidence.

[AyeChart]

08:54 AM on 02/17/2012

Terkel did NOT "poke holes in the argument." She merely re-iterated the Democratic spin while ignoring Grassley's CORRECT assessment of the situation, that it could well be a back-door citizenship ploy eventually. And what happened to EQUAL protection under the law? How is it LEGAL to confer special treatment upon selected groups? Clearly Terkel is right about one thing: ""Only Democrats, no Republicans supported it," she said. "This is clearly just showing what a partisan Congress this is and how far apart both sides are. Even this legislation is partisan."" But it is obviously the DEMOCRATS who are playing the role of Partisan in Chief in this situation. You can't have one-sided partisanship by the way. The divide has people on BOTH SIDES, you know.

[Tuleema77]

11:26 AM on 02/17/2012

Democratic spin ? Since when is stopping domestic violence a Democratic spin? Maybe you are correct, protecting all women does appear to be a Democratic issue and not the Republicans. Shame on any woman that votes for a Republican!

[MontanaSouth]

11:27 AM on 02/17/2012

humanitarian assistance is the issue for the undocumented women. Why is it that this is an issue now? It has always been in the law which has been supported by both parties twice. What is different? No one is being given special treatment. In fact, the law makes discrimination illegal. If we don't protect all women, straight, lesbian, transgender and undocumented, then there are groups of women who are getting special treatment, i.e. straight, non-lesbian, non-transgender and documented women. This is about stemming the violence, it is not political. Everyday in the US, 3 women are killed by their domestic partner. In 2010 1.5 million children were victims of child abuse (1,500 died in 2009, the last year statistics are available). I think addressing this violence is more important than worrying about giving 500/year more visas to battered undocumented women. If we have been doing this since Clinton's administration, they should be able to document if this is a back-door ploy for citizenship.

[KIVPossum]

04:34 AM on 02/17/2012

It is a good law and serves a good purpose. Unfortunately, like all good things, some people will try to abuse it.

There are plenty of sites and forum advising foreign bride how to lay the groundwork and file a claim to expidite citizenship.

However, the abuses that stem from the act are offset by the good the act does to protect ladies who gave up their lives to marry a citizen and ended in an abusive relationship.

[If6was9]

02:47 AM on 02/17/2012

Terkel seems to be one of the best political reporters on HP.

[VictoryBlue]

10:06 AM on 02/17/2012

She has quickly become one of my fav reporters.

[l78lancer]

02:38 AM on 02/17/2012

It doesn't matter if you are a woman or man, know that your safety from domestic violence is simply not important to the GOP.

So all of their talk about being the party of family values or christian values or being the champion of cultural issues is completely meaningless because the GOP is fine with allowing an abusive person kill kill their partner.

[SpencMom]

01:48 AM on 02/17/2012

When my mom married her 2nd husband I was 2 1/2. My father had walked out on us when I was 6 months old. She met and married a guy who was nice to her and seemed to have a stable life and future. It was 1966 and the term "domestic violence" didn't exist. It was a "family problem". Especially in the military. They had been married about 6 months and she was pregnant with my brother the first time he beat her until she was bloody and then raped her. She tried to leave him a couple of times but he always found us and forced her to come back. Before anybody gets started on how noone can force a woman to come back let me say that you can force a woman to do anything when you are holding a gun to her childs head. He put her in the ICU 3 times before I was 8. She didn't know til I was 23 that from the age of 6 he had been raping and sodomizing me on an almost daily basis. He "shared" me with his 2 brothers several times. To this day I am dealing with the severe chronic PTSD. So is my mom though she won't admit it. DV destroys peoples lives. That the GOP would politicize this issue makes me want to vomit. And I know my nightmares will be starting up again soon. Along w/the panic attacks

[Thaag Tidestalker]

10:36 AM on 02/17/2012

((hugs)) You would not believe how many people I know who have lived that nightmare as well. Enough to make me feel blessed that I didn't have to live it myself.

[Tuleema77]

10:57 AM on 02/17/2012

Please tell me that man (not a word he earned) is in prison or dead.

[bgofca]

01:20 AM on 02/17/2012

anyone who is a woman or cares about any woman should vote all of these horrible republicans out of office. They have made the war against women their main priority second only to doing everything possible to block anything that would make obama appear to be a good leader.

[henrypapillon]

12:58 AM on 02/17/2012

Will that be in there with the clarification that only "real" rapes will be acted on as crimes.

[SPacific]

12:41 AM on 02/17/2012

The republicans on Capitol Hill just can't help themselves......They will incur the wrath of female voters across the country this November...Count on it.......

[yumster]

05:35 AM on 02/17/2012

Don't count on it. How much have they said on the issue?

[SPacific]

12:27 PM on 02/17/2012

Not very perceptive, are you?.........

[Mr Crabs]

11:40 PM on 02/16/2012

Remember you have all the rights afforded to you, so long as you're a white male christian person. Everyone else, meh.

[Kara Kramer]

11:16 PM on 02/16/2012

The modern GOP
Pro rape
Pro wife beating
Pro abortion
Pro death in childbirth
Pro poverty
generally inhuman.
Any sane republicans would do well to leave the party now, before the new criminal recruits get round to assaulting them.

[mafiaqueen]

10:23 PM on 02/16/2012

Protect too many victims?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
Sir, I am removing the G from your last name.

[Summer77]

10:05 PM on 02/16/2012

This is a discussing attack on Women from the Republicans Period, No Women should suffer from Domestic Violence Period I don't care where their from. This whole thing makes me sick!