Congresswoman Eleanor Norton

Norton, Mayor Gray, and National Organizations Representatives to Take United Stand Against D.C. Appropriations Riders at Press Conference, Wednesday

June 7, 2011

WASHINGTON, DC - Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) expressed her gratitude for the national groups that will come forward today to explain how they plan to use their national networks and members to protect D.C.'s home rule at a press conference with Mayor Vincent Gray, DC Vote Public Affairs Director Eugene Kinlow, Human Rights Campaign Vice President of Programs David Smith, Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence President Paul Helmke, NARAL Pro-Choice America Policy Director Donna Crane, and AIDS United Political Affairs Director William McColl.  The national organizations leaders will speak for themselves and for similar organizations at the Save D.C. Home-Rule press conference on Wednesday, June 8, 3:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. in room HC-5 of the U.S. Capitol.  The speakers will discuss their intentions to use their nationwide networks to contact members of the House and Senate to protect the District's local laws from harmful congressional interference.

"I am grateful that even before the appropriations process begins, several national organizations and Mayor Gray are taking a public preemptive action against D.C. riders on the fiscal year 2012 appropriations bills," said Norton.  "Republicans have not been coy about their anti-home-rule intensions and they have not been shy about using every opportunity this year to try to erase the city's right to govern itself and to spend its local funds as residents' desire.  But D.C. was not shy in responding, either.  The rallies and arrests of the mayor, Council members, ANC commissioners, and residents leave no doubt that the city will not sit idly by and be robbed of home rule."

WHO: Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton, Mayor Vincent Gray, DC Vote, the Human Rights Campaign, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, AIDS United, NARAL Pro-Choice America, the American Civil Liberties Union, National Urban League, People for the American Way, the Center for Reproductive Rights, Planned Parenthood of the Metropolitan Washington, National Abortion Federation, Freedom to Marry, Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, and African American Ministers in Action

WHAT: Press Conference on D.C. Appropriations Riders

WHEN: Wednesday, June 8, 3:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.

WHERE: HC-5, U.S. Capitol

Attacks on the District in the 112th Congress

• On the first day of the 112th Congress, House Republicans took away the District's vote in the Committee of the Whole, despite a federal appeals court ruling upholding the constitutionality of the vote.
• The fiscal year 2011 budget deal agreed to by the administration, House Republicans and Senate Democrats re-imposed the prohibition Democrats removed last Congress on the District's use of its local funds for abortions for low-income women and established a new D.C. private school voucher program.
• House Republicans sought to prohibit the District from spending its local funds on needle-exchange programs, which are key to reducing the spread of HIV/AIDS in fiscal year 2011 (H.R. 1), but failed to get the prohibition included in the fiscal year 2011 budget deal.
• The No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act (H.R. 3), which passed in the House, would permanently bar the District from spending its local funds on abortions for low-income women, and, for the purposes of abortion, define the District of Columbia as part of the federal government.  Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee denied the Congresswoman the opportunity to testify on H.R. 3, a courtesy traditionally granted to a Member, even though the District was uniquely affected by the legislation.
• Republicans were prepared to force the District government to shut down if the federal government shut down during the fiscal year 2011 federal spending fight.  Republicans rejected Norton's amendments and bills that would have allowed the District government to spend its local funds and remain open in the event of a federal shutdown.
• Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH), the chairman of the 175-member Republican Study Committee, told The Hill newspaper that he will push to overturn the District's marriage equality law in the 112th Congress.
• The D.C. Gun Bill (H.R. 645), which killed the D.C. House Voting Rights Act last Congress, already has 127 cosponsors this year, even though a federal court has upheld the constitutionality of the District's new gun laws.  The National Rifle Association's (NRA) chief lobbyist has, again, said this year that the NRA will seek to eliminate D.C.'s gun laws.