Here we go with Jeff Sessions. Again. As if everything we know about him isn’t horrific enough for us to want to set the entire Department of Justice on fire and start again from scratch.
But now that he officially has the job of attorney general, victims advocates are rightly concerned about some of his hardline views (and, of course, his rabid racism and misogyny); specifically because America’s newest Top Cop is now in charge of enforcing the Violence Against Women Act (also known as VAWA).
Ol’ Jeff doesn’t exactly have a good record of supporting women’s rights when they are expanded beyond basic protections. As a senator in 2000 and again in 2005, he voted for VAWA which passed unanimously both times. But in 2012, it was a different story. Here’s why:
But when the law came up for review in 2012, it contained several significant additions: an increase in the number of visas available to battered immigrant women fleeing their abusers, new nondiscrimination protections for LGBT survivors of violence, and a provision granting tribal courts the authority to prosecute non-Native Americans who abused Native women on tribal land.
Senate Republicans argued that the new provisions were too broad and would invite abuse of VAWA funding. Sessions accused Democrats of including them to turn the reauthorization into a political battle. "There are matters put on that bill that almost seem to invite opposition," he told the New York Times in 2012.
What exactly was it about this that invited opposition for Jeff and the Senate Republicans? Are they so obsessed with their retrograde views on immigration, LGBT equality and civil rights that they really signed off on women being abused? Just when you thought it was impossible for them to get any worse—they go and prove once again that they are truly despicable human beings.
We also know that Jeff isn’t likely to do anything to help minorities since, in the past, he has voted against legislation to protect the very same groups covered in VAWA.
"The Violence Against Women Act is currently the only law that includes explicit protections around sexual orientation and gender identity," says Emily Waters, senior manager of national research and policy for the New York Anti-Violence Project, which provides services for LGBT victims of violence. "Without an attorney general who is willing to put resources behind that, a lot of the nondiscrimination protections lose a lot of their impact."
But Jeff, like most of the members of his party in Congress and the White House, seems to pretty much hate all women so none of this should surprise us.
Last October, Sessions was asked about the controversial 2005 Access Hollywood video that showed Trump bragging about grabbing women's genitals without their consent. "I don't characterize that as sexual assault," he told the Weekly Standard. "I think that's a stretch." [...]
Sessions has been silent on his plans for the Justice Department's Office on Violence Against Women, which is responsible for enforcing VAWA and funding services for victims. But a blueprint from the Heritage Foundation—a powerful conservative group with close ties to the Trump team—calls for eliminating all Violence Against Women grants.
Unbelievable, isn’t it? Our last president showed nothing but respect and admiration for women—including his wife. (Side note: Don’t you miss how unapologetic Barack was about showing his love for Michelle and their daughters?) Yet here we are, a mere month into Trump’s presidency and we are facing the prospect of the administration eliminating 25 grant programs designed to reduce domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking. Guess that’s what happens when the Electoral College allows a serial groper and his buddies to run the government.