Elizabeth Brundige, an expert on gender-based violence issues and executive director of the Avon Global Center for Women and Justice at Cornell University Law School, comments the U.S. Senate’s vote to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), and the chances for House support in this strengthened form.
Brundige says:
“By voting overwhelmingly to reauthorize the landmark Violence Against Women Act, the Senate demonstrated its commitment to combatting domestic and sexual violence in the United States.
“As the primary federal law providing legal protection and services to victims of gender violence, VAWA is critical to women's safety. New provisions expand its protections for groups that have traditionally fallen through the cracks, prohibiting discrimination against LGBT people by federally funded domestic violence programs and granting tribal courts jurisdiction to handle cases involving domestic violence committed on tribal lands against Native American women by non-Native men.
“Despite the Senate's support, the legislation may face a more difficult battle in the House of Representatives, where House Republicans rejected a similar reauthorization bill last year. It remains to be seen whether the House will once again oppose the bill's expanded victim protections and derail the bill, or whether, this time, it will stand with the Senate and the women of the United States against violence.”
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