The Honorable Donna F. Edwards
Military Sexual Assault in the National Defense Authorization Act
June 13, 2013
Mr. Speaker, yesterday, I joined with many of my colleagues here on the floor to urge the Congress and the Rules Committee to take seriously the disturbingly high incidences of sexual assault in the military and to act quickly and responsively to address the issue.
Yesterday, on this floor, we were promised full consideration and open debate on an issue that affects, at a minimum, 26,000 individuals in the United States armed services. And yet here we are today with a closed rule, consideration of only some amendments. And, frankly, the amendments that would actually do the most to strengthen the hand of survivors and prosecutors aren’t being considered on this floor, and that’s really unfortunate.
I feel that we have let 26,000 victims of sexual assault down. We’ve just let them down. And for all the good intentions – and I think that there were good intentions. The Congress has considered, for the last 20 years, testimony and information from the Department of Defense on its efforts to eliminate sexual assault from its ranks. These well-intentioned efforts are falling well short, and we know that.
But we can’t wake up on another day, or in another 20 years to say, You know what? We still have to solve the problem. And so I would urge us, we have to do that today for those victims. And with the estimated 26,000 – that’s up even 19,000 from 2011 – we know that something is not working.
While some of the provisions that are being considered today are good-faith efforts, the dozens, including the Speier amendment, supported by experts, advocates, and legal experts and proposed before the Rules Committee to take additional steps to show that we really do mean business are not being considered. It's really unfortunate that only half of those amendments were made in order. And with an issue as pervasive and damaging as this, where Republicans and Democrats, men and women, agree that we have to do something, why, for those 26,000 victims, aren’t we doing everything that we can?
We can’t stand on the side of the perpetrators. We must stand on the side of victims and survivors.
