Norton to Testify on Abortion Bill and Offer Amendment to Strike Provision Targeting D.C., Today

Press Release

Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) will testify on H.R. 7 at a House Rules Committee meeting today at 5:00 p.m. in H-313 The Capitol, and will offer an amendment to strike a provision that would target only the District of Columbia. The provision would permanently prohibit the city from spending its local funds on abortion services for low-income women, and would define the D.C. government as part of the federal government for the purposes of abortion. In addition to the D.C.-only provision, the bill contains other provisions Norton strongly opposes, including restricting women's access to abortion coverage in the private insurance marketplace.

Norton, in her written testimony submitted to the House Rules Committee, said, "Despite assuming the majority in the 112th Congress based on a platform of local control of local affairs, some Republicans have been obsessed with both infringing on the District's right to self-government and on interfering with the reproductive health of the nation's women, particularly the District's low-income women…The District of Columbia is a local jurisdiction of free American citizens, not a colony of the Congress. This bill is a monument to autocracy and a mockery of American democracy. This bill goes many steps too far outside the realm of our democracy. Not only would this bill harm the women of the United States, it would make matters even worse for the women of the District of Columbia by also eliminating part of the local government's authority to regulate its own affairs and spend its own funds."

Norton was denied the traditional congressional courtesy to testify on this bill, despite the provision targeting her district, by Representative Trent Franks (R-AZ), Chair of the Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice, at the Subcommittee's hearing earlier this month, before an all-male panel. While the bill is expected to pass the House, as it did last Congress, Norton will continue to work with her Senate colleagues to again defeat it. The bill is expected to go to the House floor on Tuesday or Wednesday.

The full text of Norton's testimony, as prepared for delivery, follows.

Statement of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton

H.R. 7, No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act

House Committee on Rules

January 27, 2014

I strongly oppose this sweeping anti-choice bill in its entirety, but I am here today to speak specifically to my amendment to strike the provision in this bill that singles out the District of Columbia for unequal treatment. I appreciate the opportunity to testify, particularly considering that, as the press widely reported, Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice Chairman Trent Franks denied me the traditional courtesy of testifying at the hearing on this bill, as he also did last Congress, even though one of its provisions uniquely affects the local laws and local funds of my district. Quite apart from the professional discourtesy to me, these denials were an insult to the more than 640,000 American citizens I represent. Members of Congress are usually afforded the courtesy of testifying, especially when a bill uniquely affects their districts.

Despite assuming the majority in the 112th Congress based on a platform of local control of local affairs, some Republicans have been obsessed with both infringing on the District's right to self-government and on interfering with the reproductive health of the nation's women, particularly the District's low-income women. In three years of Republican control of the House, this is the fourth bill, not including the annual D.C. abortion rider in appropriations bills, that would both violate the District's right to self-government and harm its female residents. The District of Columbia provision is an attempt to codify a Republican-sponsored appropriations rider that prohibits D.C. from spending its local funds on abortion services for low-income women.

H.R. 7 would permanently prohibit the District of Columbia government, but no other jurisdiction in the United States, from using its own funds for abortion services for low-income women, uniquely denying the District government the same right local and state governments exercise to protect the reproductive health of their female residents. Seventeen states, including Alaska, Arizona and Montana, use their own funds to provide abortion services for low-income women.

The bill also attempts to rewrite history to pretend that Congress did not pass the Home Rule Act of 1973. Under the Home Rule Act, Congress delegated its legislative authority over the District to an elected local government, except for a small number of enumerated exceptions, and the right to reproductive choice was not among those exceptions. H.R. 7 appears to recognize that Congress cannot legislate local law for a local government when it torturously redefines the term "federal government" to include the term "District of Columbia government" for purposes of abortion. In particular, the bill would ban abortions in facilities owned or operated by the federal government, which, by definition in H.R. 7, would ban abortions in facilities owned or operated by the D.C. government. Moreover, the bill would prohibit a physician or other individual employed by the federal government from performing an abortion, which, by definition in H.R. 7, would prohibit a physician or other individual employed by the D.C. government from performing an abortion. The contortions upon which this provision depends undermine any claim for its legitimacy.

The District of Columbia is a local jurisdiction of free American citizens, not a colony of the Congress. This bill is a monument to autocracy and a mockery of American democracy. This bill goes many steps too far outside the realm of our democracy. Not only would this bill harm the women of the United States, it would make matters even worse for the women of the District of Columbia by also eliminating part of the local government's authority to regulate its own affairs and spend its own funds. We do not intend to let Republicans get away with supporting democracy everywhere on earth except in our own nation's capital.

Republicans say they support limiting the federal government's power and devolving that power to the states and localities. This bill does the opposite. It uses federal power to snatch local authority from the District of Columbia and its people. Republicans may not want to practice what they preach, but we do not intend to allow them to violate their own principles at our expense.

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