Senate reauthorizes domestic violence act
WASHINGTON, April 26 (UPI) -- The U.S. Senate Thursday voted to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act, which faces a partisan dispute when it reaches the House.
The Senate voted 68-31 to reauthorize the act after Democrats, who control the chamber, refused to allow votes on a Republican version of the bill, The Washington Post reported. The bill the Senate approved had 61 Senate co-sponsors, including eight Republicans.
House Republicans oppose several provisions in the Senate bill and are proposing an alternative version in the House, the newspaper said.
The law was enacted in 1994, and was reauthorized in 2000 and again in 2005. The bill approved Thursday includes new provisions that would, among other things, establish programs to promote awareness on college campuses of domestic violence-related issues.
Senate Republicans objected to a provision barring discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in programs funded by the law, and a provision allowing law enforcement agencies to issue more visas to undocumented immigrants who help prosecute perpetrators of certain domestic violence.
Vice President Joe Biden issued a statement following the Senate vote urging the House to "move quickly and pass the bill."
"This law has been overwhelmingly successful since it was first enacted 17 years ago to improve the criminal justice response to this violent crime and to assist those who experience this abuse," Biden said. "Since then, the law has twice been reauthorized with the broad support of members of both parties. It should still be bigger than politics today."
Boehner, White House trade political barbs
WASHINGTON, April 26 (UPI) -- U.S. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Thursday President Barack Obama makes the "biggest job in the world" look small.
Speaking at a news conference in Washington, Boehner said there are "clear difference in the focus of the two parties right now: Republicans focused on jobs and the economy, passing nearly 30 bills blocked by the Senate. The president's party has a different focus, and it's about politics, not about the American people. …
"This week the president traveled across the country on taxpayers' dime -- at a cost of $179,000 an hour -- insisting that Congress fix a problem that we were already working on," Boehner said, referring to the congressional action needed to prevent the interest rate on Stafford student loans from doubling.
"These are the types of political stunts -- and, frankly, they aren't … worthy of his office," Boehner said, adding Obama's actions are "beneath the dignity of the White House."
"This is the biggest job in the world, and I've never seen a president make it smaller. … It's as simple as this: The emperor has no clothes," he said.
White House spokesman Jay Carney responded to Boehner's allegations, telling reporters: "I understand that Speaker Boehner and Republicans on Capitol Hill are busy backing and filling, trying to explain how they can support -- how they now support fixing the student loan interest rate problem, when they all voted in favor of a Republican budget, the Ryan budget -- their governing document -- which explicitly took another course of action and would have allowed interest rate loans on -- Stafford loans to double. So they can't have it both ways."
Minn. governor vetoes abortion clinic bill
MINNEAPOLIS, April 26 (UPI) -- Minnesota's governor Thursday vetoed a bill that would have required the state to license abortion clinics.
Sponsored by state Sen. Claire Robling, a Republican, the legislation would have required the state to license any clinic that does 10 or more abortions a month, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported
Gov. Mark Dayton, a member of the Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party, said in his veto letter the bill would have imposed "inappropriate and unworkable" new requirements on the clinics, and was so vague, complaints could have been filed for any reason.
Clinics would have been monitored for "conduct or practices detrimental to the welfare of the patient,"
The governor said the state's six abortion clinics are among 1,250 outpatient clinics in the state that operate without requiring a state license, the Star Tribune reported.
But the regular clinics operate under strict oversight, the newspaper said.
Supporters said the measure was common-sense and it was absurd for the state to license tattoo parlors and hair-braiding salons, but not abortion clinics.
Dayton responded that if the issue was health and not just abortion politics, then the state should license all 1,250 outpatient clinics, not just the six abortion clinics, the newspaper reported.
Meanwhile, a bill to require a physician be present when abortion pills are prescribed or taken passed the Legislature Thursday morning.
Font size may keep issue off Mich. ballot
LANSING, Mich., April 26 (UPI) -- Opponents of a contentious Michigan law say they may go to court to fight a decision by elections officials to keep a challenge to the law off the state ballot.
The four-member Board of State Canvassers voted 2-2 along party lines Thursday on the question of whether the repeal of the hotly contested emergency managers law should go before voters in November. The tie vote means the issue cannot be on the ballot, the Lansing (Mich.) State Journal reported.
The emergency managers law gives the state authority to dissolve local governments and school boards and invalidate labor contracts in case of financial distress.
Elections officials had determined there were enough petition signatures -- 203,238, or 40,000 more than necessary -- to put repeal of the law on the ballot. A group associated with state Republicans argued the petitions were out of compliance with state law because they used a too-small font size.
Supporters of the repeal petition said they will take the matter to the state Court of Appeals, the Detroit Free Press reported. They said a ruling to place the issue on the ballot would have suspended of the law, enacted in 2011 after Republican Rick Snyder was elected governor and the GOP won control of the state legislature.
