andy greenberg discusses russian hackers. on sunday at 10:30 a.m. eastern, live coverage continues with former under secretary of state in the obama administration richard stable on the proliferation of disinformation and international politics. david marinus on the 1950s red scare. journalist elinor randolph discusses michael bloomberg. former deputy director of the cia counterterrorism ctr. philip mudd talks about the state of cia detention centers and former football player john mcpherson on toxic masculinity. watch live coverage of the miami book fair today and sunday on c-span2's booktv. >> wednesday on the senate floor, but diane feinstein and joni ernst presented competing legislation under the violence against women act. senators john cornyn, dan sullivan and marsha blackburn

join in the push to reauthorize the violence against women act. this is 45 minutes. >> i rise today to speak on the violence against women reauthorization act of 2019. this bill passed the house by 263-158, with 33 republicans supporting it. a week ago along with every other senate democrat i introduced a bill in the senate. people on the front lines helping these victims wrote these bills. this bill is not a democratic bill. it is not a republican bill. this bill is a survivors bill. it is written with the help of survivors who know what is needed in the real world. the bill accomplishes two things. it preserves the advancements we made during the last reauthorization in 2013 and

includes certain meaningful improvements to the law. in particular there are three key elements. one, it expands jurisdiction over non-native americans for domestic violence offenses and crimes against children, elders and law enforcement. violence is a big problem on tribal land and the best way to address it is to allow the tribes to prosecute these crimes. unfortunately, some instead want to circumvent the tribal justice system that we know works and this moves us in the wrong direction. secondly the bill builds on antidiscrimination protections for the lgbt community. and the 2013 reauthorization, congress declared federal grant recipients could use funds to train staff to recognize and

combat discrimination against lgbt individuals. unfortunately the law wasn't clear and organizations are still uncertain if they can use funds for this purpose. this bill simply clarifies that intend. it is a small but important change to help the at risk community and their has been surprising resistance from some on the republican side to include this modest language. and third hour bill keeps guns out of the hands of domestic abusers. it does this by adding intimate partners and stockers to the existing list of individuals who can be banned from possessing firearms. we know the presence of a firearm in a domestic violence situation increases the odds of a woman being killed by 500%.

that is a major increase in risk. it only makes sense to take guns away from convicted domestic abusers who may use them to kill their spouses or partners. there is simply no way to stop domestic violence but we have a duty to do all we can and this bill takes significant improvements in the law. so mister president, i would ask unanimous consent that a time to be determined by the majority leader in consultation with the democratic leader no later than before the end of this year the judiciary committee be discharged from further consideration of death 283 and the senate proceed to its immediate consideration of the only amendments in order be two germane amendments, that debate on the bill be limited

to one hour and amendments limited to 30 minutes each, equally divided between the two leaders or their designate's, that upon the use or yielding back of time the senate in relation to the amendments, upon the disposition of the amendment, the bill as amended if amended be read a third time and the senate vote on passage and finally amendments and passage be subject to a 60 affirmative vote threshold all with no intervening action or debate. >> mister president. >> senator from iowa. >> reserving the right to object, mister president. mister president, i am on the floor today to speak my piece about the violence against women act and i speak to this body not just as a senator but i speak to this body is a

survivor of rape and as the survivor of domestic violence. from months, for months the senior senator from california and i worked together on a piece of legislation that would reauthorize the violence against women act, a bipartisan effort, and effort that brought the senator and i together in an effort to reauthorize the bill with as much support in this body as possible. we were working together in good faith to make our way through the issues that affect so many women in abusive situations, partners in abusive

situations, domestic violence situations where children are involved, to find a common path forward, to have this bill reauthorized with as much possible support in this body at a time when america views us as so politically divided. what could bring us together? the issue of violence directed at women and children and survivors of sexual assault. that should bring us together. months of bipartisan effort. but pressure was given to immediately introduce the house bill, the house passed version of violence against women.

we were moving ahead with steady progress in a number of these areas but political pressure to introduce the house passed version of the bill, not one that we could come together with on the floor of the senate. one that even the democrats in their press gaggle addressing the house version of violence against women, they said would never make it through the senate. why on earth would we introduce a piece of legislation that will not make it through this body? shouldn't we be working together to find a path forward? we should continue to work on that. and i hope sincerely that by the end of this year we can come together as republicans and democrats and not present a

republican version or democrat version but produce a version that will pass this body and protect those who are in a very vulnerable state. i have been in that vulnerable state before and i appreciated the assistance that was given to me by folks that were funded by this piece of legislation. so with that, mister president i object. >> mister president. >> senator from california has the floor. >> i was just going to ask if the senator, senator ernst, would yield for a moment. i know we had some good discussions and they broke off and i'm very happy to continue to work on this. i felt it was important to enter the house bill because of those three very important provisions that i just went over which are in essence the 3

improvements on the bill if you will. i have no problem sitting down now and we can discuss it and if we can find a way that we can agree i think that would be just fine but in the interests of time and because there has been a substantial period of time, i decided to introduce it. the three issues are tribal sovereignty, the lgbt people and the gun provisions and those are the three house provisions. i can still stop and i would be happy to do this, sit down and discuss them if you would like. thank you, mister chairman. >> i truly do appreciate the senior senator from california's remarks and i truly have enjoyed working on this piece of legislation with you. there were three markers that were laid down within the house

version of the bill as outlined previously but there was no consensus there. it was either you accept these provisions or we don't work together. we need to keep finding a way to bring us to consensus on a bill that will move through this body and i'm happy to continue working on legislation with you. i think by the end of this year we should find something that will work to reauthorize this very important piece of legislation and i appreciate your leadership on this very much and truly have enjoyed working with you. >> mister president, in response to the senator. i'm very happy to accept the invitation. we can sit down and continue to work on this but i would point out these three provisions have

tremendous support, the tribal sovereignty, protections for the lgbt community and the spouse protection when a spouse has a weapon. so those are rather difficult over here. they were not in the house but who knows? maybe we can work something out and i'm happy to try. >> mister president. >> senator from iowa. >> mister president, the violence against women act turned 25 years old this year and as many of us are aware this law provides desperately needed resources to tackle domestic and sexual abuse in our communities and it needs to be reauthorized. i wasn't in the senate the last time this bill was passed. that was in 2013 and i wanted

to be part of the process of getting the bill done this time around. as a woman, as a survivor and as someone who volunteered at a women's shelter in college i understand just how awful violence against women can be. in terms of physical and mental well-being, in terms of self-image. in terms of our families and in terms of the security of the whole of society. from and the ranking member of the senate judiciary committee and i worked to develop a bipartisan proposal that i really thought we could get across the finish line because folks, that old schoolhouse

rock video would say, without passing the house, the senate and getting a signature from the president all you have is a bill. just a bill. not a law. and now survivors are helped by a bill. but here we are today after months of work and mountains of effort that went into working toward a bipartisan bill and at some point, someone pressed the big red button of partisan politics, and the democrats refuse to work together any longer, walking away from the real progress that we have made. not only did they walk away from the negotiating table but

did so by dropping a bill that is going nowhere as they have acknowledged. the senate democrats bill is a nonstarter. it won't passed the senate. it won't get the president's signature. and most importantly it won't actually help the survivors that need it. these politics are sad. we should be helping survivors, not engaging in the kind of partisan antics that will never produce real results. we have seen this before. the democrats will say republican women can't speak for women because we don't agree point by point with their leftist agenda and these are worn-out tactics, my friends. however, despite the minorities decision to walk away and put politics ahead of survivors i'm

leading our effort to continue getting a bill done that focuses on providing the resources and support survivors across the country need. for women and children in urban and rural areas like mine. my goal has always been to empower survivors, to punish abusers and enhance the overall purpose behind this very important law. that is why this week i plan to put forward a bill that puts survivors first. we have included a number of issues senate democrats failed to address. for example, this should be so simple, folks. we are holistically addressing female genital mutilation. we tripled the amount of funding available for

education, and sexual assault prevention. we also focused more on enhancing the penalties for abusers and as a matter of fact, one of the most objectionable and unacceptable items in the senate democrat bill is that they allow accused abusers to go outside of the justice system and negotiate directly with their victim, with their victim, those women, those abused survivors that have already been manipulated and beat down. it allows those abusers to negotiate directly with their victims.

that is of course as long as the victim consents. as if an abusive relationship ever involved consent. outside of the justice system, folks. outside of the justice system. it is unimaginable that we would allow or fund such an abusive system or abusive situation and allow abusers to escape justice. i think abusers should face justice and i'm not sure why our senate democrat colleagues don't agree. mister president, coming from a rural area of our country, i made sure we prioritized world resources in our bill. we are offering increased funding for housing assistance

so that women and children can be safe from their abusers. when you live in an area like mine, rural montgomery county, red oak, iowa, the nearest shelter is an hour away. you virtually cut off a woman and her children from any job she might have had, any families she might have had, it truly takes them out of their life. by offering these housing resources through voucher programs our bill enables them to rent an apartment or home in their home community. imagine what we could do in this body if we worked with a

single purpose instead of a dozen different motives. this entire body pulling together with a single purpose. and democrats and republicans, i hope we can all join together in this effort. how many violent abusers could we put behind bars to keep survivors safe? how many more people would be alive today? i want to thank my colleagues for joining me based on the violence against women act and i want to send a message to the countless survivors across the country. we are with you, we hear you and we are working for you.

and with that i yield the floor. >> mister president, i would like to begin by thanking our friend and colleague senator ernst for her leadership on the reauthorization and important point should be made to strengthen the violence against women act. we don't have to settle for the house bill. we could have a better bill for victims of domestic violence but unfortunately like so much important work we seem to constantly get deciphered and distracted and dragged down by the partisanship that seems to dominate in washington dc these days. for many months our colleague from iowa has been working closely with senator feinstein, senator from california to try to figure way to reauthorize

this critical law. in the meantime, though, not on one occasion but i'm two occasions, we have offered a continuing resolution that would extend the current reauthorization and our democratic colleagues have shut that down and so we are in uncharted territory where we don't currently have an authorization for the violence against women act so i share our colleague's disappointment when a democratic colleagues walked away from the negotiating table and chose to introduce a replica of the house's partisan bill which as you have heard does not have the support to pass in the senate. let me say one thing that should be abundantly clear but sometimes gets lost, we all agree, we all agree that more must be done to prevent violence and respond to it. it is fair to say we have different opinions on what

those pathways look like but one thing should not be up for debate, whether or not we reauthorize the violence against women act, that is something we need to do but the fact is we don't have to settle for the house bill. we can do better. democratic colleagues took an interesting approach in introducing a bill that a majority of people in this chamber will not support and they know that. sadly that is part of the point. they know they have a bill that does not enjoy consensus support because they would rather make the political point and argument that somehow some of us on this side don't believe in supporting victims of domestic violence which is absolutely a falsehood. it is alive. during a press conference the senator from hawaii conceded 5 times that the house bill was going nowhere but that is the path our democratic colleagues

have chosen rather than working in a bipartisan fashion to build a consensus package that can become law they decided to head down a partisan path led by the house bill which came to a 7 months ago. so clearly some of our colleagues in the senate are not interested in actually making laws. they are in it for the headlines, for the politics. so in the face of this ridiculous and unacceptable jockeying i'm glad the today senator ernst will introduce a consensus alternative to the bill offered by colleagues and i'm proud to be a cold sponsor of the legislation. this bill introduced by the senator from iowa will send more funding and more resources than the democrat bill. it is actually better and it will authorize a program for twice as long.

and was being jerked around bipartisan games. and that is horrific crimes against women and girls. sex trafficking is not always recognized as a form of sexual assault and it is, but this bill would make that clear. it would also enhance the maximum criminal penalties for sexual abuse of minors and other vulnerable groups. it will come as you heard, take aim at heinous crimes like mutilation and address crimes in rural areas and on tribal lands. this legislation includes provisions from a number of bipartisan bills that have been introduced in the senate that involve resources for victims and target specific types of abuse. one example is a bill i introduced with the senator from california, senator

feinstein, called the heels act that would remove some of the hurdles that exist between victims of domestic violence and their access to safe housing. that is in our bill. this provision would also include greater flexibility for transitional housing program so that survivors can get back on their feet without the fear of losing the roof over their head. this bill includes language introduced by senators murkowski and cortez master to combat the epidemic of murders and missing native women and girls. it would allow for better law enforcement coordination and provide tribal law enforcement with more resources to address these crimes. it is critical that we all call attention to these despicable acts of violence and unequivocally reject them without regard to partisanship. another challenge we face is technology outpacing our

ability to counter certain types of exploitation, abuse of images and videos proliferate online. this is a relatively new challenge but it is real and it is on the present. this legislation will empower victims to remove the content by using copyright takedown authority. it also establishes an innovation fund for the office on violence against women to address emerging trends of victims get the support they need as quickly as possible. if you compare this legislation to the bill passing the house and introduced by our democratic colleagues. there is no question our version does more to support survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. it provides more funding over a longer period of time and targets despicable crimes that are being committed across the country that aren't even

covered by the house bill. whitney close and thank our friend from iowa for continuing to fight for victims of domestic violence and sexual assault and for leading the effort to reauthorize the violence against women act. a bill that never should have lapsed, despite two attempts to continue it that our democratic colleagues objected to. i'm proud to be a cosponsor of this bill and look forward to working with all our colleagues to advance. i hope our colleagues will return to the negotiating table and work with us so we can send along to reauthorization of the violence against women act to the president's desk for his signature. >> senator from north dakota. >> i rise to join my colleagues in calling for the reauthorization of the violence

against women act, it was foundational to addressing domestic violence and sexual assault and supporting survivors in their recovery. it expired earlier this year and it is critical that the services and tools offered through the law are reauthorized so we can continue to help and empower survivors. additionally it is important we make it known that crimes of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence and stocking are not tolerated. senator ernst will be introducing this legislation which i am cosponsoring to reauthorize the violence against women act. this bill includes key tribal provisions such as expanding tribal criminal jurisdiction, upholding tribal sovereignty while amending the 2013, providing increased funding for indian tribes to address violence committed against indians on their land was the department of justice report found more than four in five american indian, alaskan, native women experience violence in their lifetime, native women are significantly more likely to experience cases

of stocking and physical violence by an intimate partner. under senator ernst's bill indian tribes will be allowed to train more lawyers and tribal court judges, further strengthening the tribal criminal justice system, have access to increase data and reporting on the subject of missing and murdered indians and required the department of justice to issue annual reports to congress in order to thoroughly track the progress of a special criminals jurisdiction and better determine trends of violence committed on indian lands. the committee on indian affairs has held hearings on violence against indians and on missing and murdered native americans. as chairman of the committee i introduced legislation that would increase resources to indian victims of crime. the senate majority includes my survive act which would provide indian tribes with a 5% tribal set aside for crime victims

fund. prior to our work on this initiative, tried accessing less than 1% of this important funding. as a member of the appropriations committee i included a primal set aside in three previous fiscal years, justice packages which underscores the importance of passing authorizing language such as my survive act. this also includes savanna's act which was named for savanna, a pregnant woman from my home state who went missing and was found murdered eight days later. savanna's project death did not go unnoticed and raised awareness about missing and murdered native american women. savanna's act will address cases of missing or murdered indians by directing the attorney general to review,

revise and develop law enforcement and control justice guidelines, improving access to federal databases, holding tribal consultations with indian tribes, tribal organizations and urban indian organizations when the department of justice develop sentiments guidelines, requiring training and technical assistance to indian tribes participating in guidelines, implementation process and mandating data collection and reporting by the department of justice. the senate majority version includes important tribal bills and i'm proud to be a cosponsor of senator ernst's bill. there are many great provisions in this bill and i hope my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will give it serious consideration. we must act to reauthorize it to support survivors and provide them with the assistance they need to recover. we authorizing also that sexual assault, dating violence and stocking are not tolerated in this country and we will

continue to support survivors. thank you. i yield the floor. >> senator from alaska. >> i want to join my colleagues on the importance of the reauthorization and in particular i want to thank senator ernst for months of hard work that she has put into this bill that we are introducing today. i am a proud cosponsor of that bill, but you saw in her remarks earlier her passion, her energy, her focus on rural america which is very important to me and my great state of alaska. and i am hopeful as all my colleagues here, including our friend from california senator feinstein, that we the senate will get to a place where we can have a bipartisan bill that is going to reauthorize the violence against women act, this is important for america and alaska.

i come down on the floor every weekend talk about someone who is doing something great in my state. i want to brag about the great state of alaska. it is amazing place but i will tell you there is one area we are not so amazing. my state has the highest rates of domestic violence and sexual assault of any state in america. it is horrendous. the numbers, the victims, the carnage that this leaves in alaska and throughout our country is something we should be able to come together and fix and we can do this, mister president. i want to talk about a provision in senator ernst's bill that is something i have been working on with her but importantly with many senators including a lot of my democratic colleagues. it is title 12 of the bill, called the choose respect title. this is a series of bills that i have introduced with senators gillibrand, harris, coons, my

democratic colleagues, and it is focused on trying to change the culture and get more legal resources to victims, to survivors. why is that so important, mister president? when you look at the studies that show what is the best way for a survivor to break out of the cycle of violence they often find themselves in? one of the answers is to get them an attorney. it empowers them. it enables them to use the justice system to their advantage and yet here is the problem, mister president. when you look on literally on a daily basis we lack of legal representation for victims and survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault is endemic across the country endemic. so a number of elements of this

bill particularly under the choose respect title are going to try to change this. last year we had legislation that i authored that was passed in the law signed by the president, power acted that was about getting more legal resources for survivors. it was a good start but it doesn't do enough. this year in this bill, a bill that i cosponsored earlier with senator harris in california is that it focuses on this issue. think about this. if you have an accused abuser, let's say an accused rapist and there is an indictment. under the sixth amendment of the u.s. constitution, that perpetrator gets a right to counsel, okay? that is our constitution. that is fine. what does the victim get? what does the survivor get? right now nothing. nothing. and far too often that victim goes without any legal representation.

and that is the beginning, often, of a cycle they fall into. one of the provisions of this would be through state domestic violence councils, the federal government would be helping to ensure a goal that once there is an indictment of a crime of violence, then the victim should also get an attorney. so, mister president, these are just some of the elements of this bill. senator gillibrand and i have the choose respect act which would have a public advocacy program to try to get young men in particular to start changing our culture, not just a problem in alaska, it is a problem throughout the country. there are many things in this bill that are very bipartisan and i certainly am committed to work with senator cornyn and senator hoven and senator blackburn and senator feinstein

and senator ernst to get to the compromises we need to make in the senate to pass this bill. that is what we want to have done. that is why we are on the floor talking about this passionately. i think we can do it, because it is too important to miss this opportunity to pass legislation to help the most vulnerable people in our country and in my state and i'm certainly committed to working with everybody here to make it happen. i yield the floor. >> mister president. >> senator from tennessee. >> i ask unanimous consent that i be allowed to complete my remarks before the vote. also i ask that in relation to the suckers of a man nomination of confirmed the motion be to reconsider, be considered, made and laid upon the table and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. >> without objection. >> thank you, mister president. today i am pleased to stand with senator ernst and my

colleagues and to talk about the 2019 violence against women act. most women will tell you that they know of a female friend or acquaintance or relative who has experienced the horrors of sexual assault or domestic violence, or even trafficking. through my work with shelters in tennessee, i have learned that the volunteers, counselors, advocates, attorneys, who support these victims are of the utmost importance. that is who the victim needs to see the minute they walk through that door into the arms of somebody who says how can we help you, this is a safe place. those are the people that come around them to empower them and

the one thing that i hear over and over in the wake of an attack these victims need that tight support. that is why in addition to providing funding for prevention and education programs, this year's authorization will do some important things. it increases funding for the court-appointed special advocates by $3 million. it provides over $1 million per year for federal victim counselors and helps provide transitional housing to victims which is something they desperately need. mister president, they need to know they have a safe place. these resources, this is important. these resources are going to go directly into the hands of

those providing services and it will have a direct impact on the lives of these women, when they need it most. just for a moment i would like to highlight a portion of the reauthorization where i have spent the good bit of time. it has to do with a particular violent sexual crime that is grotesque, most americans prefer not to even acknowledge it. they don't want to admit that this exists but for the victims of female genital mutilation, the pain and humiliation are nearly unbearable. you would think federal prosecutors would be able to make short work out of such heinous charges but due to a loophole in federal criminal law scores of victims have

watched their abusers walk free. the federal prohibition of female genital mutilation act of 2019, a separate bill i started earlier this year is now a part of this year's violence against women reauthorization. it will correct fatal constitutional flaws in the federal statute banning the practice of ft l. when this is done prosecutions for mutilation and cutting will be able to continue under federal law. i would be remiss if i did not say that in a perfect world we would not have to worry about allocating resources for safehouses and victim counseling. we should not have to do this but this is not a perfect world. so yes indeed, we have to step up and do this for the sake of

thousands of women who will fall victim to sexual violence, trafficking, sexual abuse each year. so i urge all of my colleagues on both sides of this file, let's come together, let's work on this, let's pass the 2019 violence against women act. i yield the floor. >> the original violence against women act was passed in 1994 and has been reauthorized 3 times since then. the most recent version expired in february of this year. in an interview with an iowa paper the day after this debate senator ernst said she will continue working with democrats to find a compromise among different versions of the bill that could pass the senate. >> i think a national primary

is probably one of the worst reforms we could implement. i would if we were doing it in a rational way have a rotating regional primary so that we basically, in different elections, have different groups of states go together which would allow focused retail campaigning. >> learn about the presidential nominating process sunday night on qa day. lara brown from george washington university discusses how we nominate presidential candidates and what reforms to the process may be in the offing. watch sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span's qa day. >> the house will be in order. >> for 40 years c-span has been providing america unfiltered

coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court and public policy events from washington dc and around the country so you can make up your own mind. created by cable in 1979, c-span has been brought to you by your local cable or satellite provider. c-span, you're in filtered view of government. >> starting now, booktv on c-span2. every weekend, 48 hours of nonfiction authors and books. >> this weekend we are live from the miami book fair with author discussions, interviews and viewer call in segments, you will hear from republican senator tom caught in of arkansas, former obama administration national security adviser and un ambassador susan rice and tomorrow, richard stengel, former under secretary of state and the obama administration, who will answer your questions about disinformation and journalist eleanor randolph or put on the business and political careers of former new