Biography

Congresswoman Louise McIntosh Slaughter is one of the most powerful and unique voices in the House of Representatives. Representing the 25th Congressional District of New York, Louise was first elected to Congress in 1986, and is now serving her 14th term in the House of Representatives.

In 2007, Louise became the first woman to chair of the influential House Committee on Rules, where she helped to bring the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, and the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act to passage. Louise also serves on the prestigious Democratic Steering & Policy Committee and is co-chair of the Congressional Pro-Choice Caucus, of which she is also a founding member. Her other co-chairships include the Congressional Bicameral Caucus on the High Speed and Intercity Passenger Rail to advance the construction of a high-speed and intercity passenger rail (HSIPR) network across the United States, the Congressional Arts Caucus, which supports the arts through federal initiatives, and the Great Lakes Task Force, an advocate for policies and programs that seek to restore the Great Lakes.

Over the years, Louise has earned a reputation for her dedication to constituent service and for taking on the fights no one else will.  She remained true to her constituency even when it meant breaking with her own party on free trade agreements, including the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), or fighting for accountability by authoring the groundbreaking report “America for Sale,” which blew the whistle on corruption amongst powerful members of Congress, and the STOCK Act, which outlawed insider trading by members of Congress and their staff, as well as the Supreme Court Ethics Act, which applies a binding code of conduct to members of the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2014, she championed the Water Resources Reform and Development Act, which established the Great Lakes Navigation System as a single entity for federal funding purposes, which reduces competition for collaborative efforts.

As the only microbiologist in Congress, Louise continues to lead the charge in addressing the major science and health-related issues of our time. Thanks to her hard work and dedication, the Genetic Information and Non-Discrimination Act, or "GINA," is now Public Law No.110-223. Called, the "first civil rights legislation of the 21st Century" by the late Senator Edward Kennedy, GINAprevents health insurance companies from revoking an individual's insurance or employers from terminating an employee based upon genetic information.

Congresswoman Slaughter authored the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act (PAMTA), which would end the routine use of antibiotics on healthy animals and curb the growing threat of antibiotic resistant bacteria, or superbugs. This kind of habitual use has been linked to the growing threat of antibiotic-resistant infections in humans. In 2011, Louise confirmed with the FDA that 80 percent of all antibiotics used in the United States are used on animals, threatening the usefulness of these miracle drugs in humans. PAMTA would phase out the use of 8 important classes of antibiotics on healthy animals while allowing for their use to treat sick animals.

In the 1990’s, Congresswoman Slaughter served on the House Budget Committee, where she secured the first $500 million earmarked by Congress for breast cancer research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). She successfully fought for the passage of legislation that guarantees women and minorities the right to be included in all federal health trials, and established the Office of Research on Women's Health (ORWH) at the NIH. Ten years after the creation of ORWH, the NIH awarded Louise the “Visionary for Women's Health Research” award.

In 1994, Louise co-authored the historic Violence Against Women Act and wrote legislation that made the Office on Violence Against Women a permanent fixture at the U.S. Department of Justice. Currently, Louise is leading the fight against sexual assault in the military.  Since 2004, Congresswoman Slaughter has introduced numerous pieces of comprehensive legislation and amendments to ensure transparency, justice, and accountability within all branches of the armed forces surrounding the handling of sexual assault.

Congresswoman Slaughter has been widely published in national newspapers, as well as national law reviews, including the Stanford Law and Policy Review regarding Supreme Court ethics reform and the Harvard Journal on Legislation regarding the Genetic Information Non-Discrimination Act.

Prior to entering Congress, Louise served in the New York State Assembly (1982-86) and the Monroe County Legislature (1976-79); and was regional coordinator to then-Secretary of State Mario Cuomo (1976-78) and to then-Lt. Gov. Mario Cuomo (1979-82).

Rep. Slaughter was born in Harlan County, Kentucky and holds a Bachelor of Science degree (1951) in Microbiology and a Master of Science degree (1953) in Public Health, both from the University of Kentucky. She was married to her husband, the late Bob Slaughter, and has three daughters and seven grandchildren.

Accomplishments

Louise entered Congress in January 1987 and immediately went to work fighting to improve the lives of the people of Rochester, NY.  Below is a partial list of Louise's accomplishments as a Member of Congress

1987: Won inclusion of language in the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, signed into law by President Reagan, allowing children to continue to attend the same school if their family became homeless and moved to a shelter out of district.

1990: Won passage of an amendment to the Immigration Act of 1990 that allowed a battered spouse who was a legal alien to file for permanent residence without the cooperation of the batterer.

1992: Won passage of the DES (diethylstilbestrol) Education and Research Amendments of 1992, providing for further research into the effects of DES – once used as an anti-miscarriage drug with devastating health consequences to mothers and their children exposed in utero.

1993: Secured the first $500 million dedicated to breast cancer research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

1993: Ensured that all research at the NIH included women and minorities in clinical trials – previously all research was done on white males, even in predominantly female diseases such as breast cancer.

1994: Co-authored the Violence Against Women Act, signed into law by President Clinton, providing protections for victims of domestic violence for the first time and continuing to provide vital services to survivors of abuse today.

1996: Included language in pesticide legislation that became law requiring a review of all federal programs that assess or mitigate the risks to women's health from environmental exposures.

2000: Worked with local businesses to bring Jet Blue Airlines to Rochester.

2005: Led the effort to save the Niagara Falls Air Reserve Station from the Department of Defense's Base Realignment and Closure Commission

2005: Helped secure $5 million in federal funding for ARTWalk – 2,375 linear feet of sculptures, outdoor art displays, and interactive exhibits set in downtown Rochester.

2007: Became the first woman to serve as the Chair of the influential House Committee on Rules.

2008: Won passage of the Genetic Information Non-Discrimination Act (GINA), a law that protects individuals from discrimination by employers or health insurers based on genetic predispositions to health conditions2009: Persuaded the Department of Defense to recall 16,000 pieces of body armor and replace them with safer armor to protect our troops in harm's way.

2009: Won passage of the National Women's Rights History Project Act – after nearly a decade of work with then-Senator Hillary Clinton – as part of the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009, authorizing the Votes for Women Trail, an auto route linking historical sites with importance to the struggle for women's rights and suffrage.

2009: Brought the Affordable Care Act to the floor of the House of Representatives for an historic vote, expanding and improving health care for Americans.

2009: Secured $90.1 million in federal funds for the construction of a second railroad track between Albany and Schenectady to improve passenger service.

2010: Won passage of the Airline Safety and Pilot Training Improvement Act in the wake of the Colgan Air Flight #3407 disaster in the Buffalo area.

2010: Secured $16.5 million in federal funding for the Niagara Falls International Railway Station and Intermodal Transportation Center.

2010: Ushered the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2010 to the floor of the House of Representatives, providing large increases in the size of Pell grants, strengthening the Perkins loan program, and drastically lowering interest rates on federally subsidized student loans.

2010: Brought the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act to the floor of the House of Representatives, ensuring that unchecked corporate greed will never again bring America to financial collapse.

2011: Brought the Department of Labor's Deputy Secretary and local farmers together leading to necessary changes in the H-2A agricultural guestworker program.

2011: Secured $62.5 million in federal funding for the laser lab at University of Rochester.

2011: Secured $300 million in federal funding for the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative and $23.7 million for the Great Lakes Fishery Commission.

2011: Won inclusion of four key provisions of the Force Protection Readiness Act – improving the prevention and prosecution of sexual assault in the military – in the National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2012.

2012: Won passage of the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act, making insider trading by Members of Congress and their staffs illegal.

2012: Secured $15 million in federal funding for the Rochester Intermodal Transportation Center.

2012: Won passage of the Stop Invasive Species Act as part of the Surface Transportation bill, protecting the Great Lakes from the threat of Asian Carp.