The U.S. House of Representatives has rescheduled its vote on HR 515, International Megan’s Law, for Monday, February 1. As originally scheduled, the vote will be under a “suspension of the rules” and therefore debate will be limited to no more than 40 minutes and require a 2/3 vote of those present regardless of how many members are in attendance.
“There is still time to send E-mails this weekend and to make phone calls on Monday,” stated CA RSOL president Janice Bellucci. “The vote on this and seven other bills is not scheduled to begin until 6:30 p.m. (Eastern).”
A list of all bills to be considered under “suspension of the rules” follows below. According to Congressional rules, this type of consideration is limited to bills that are noncontroversial.
“Under a ‘suspension of the rules’, a small number of Congressional members can pass a bill by voice vote and there is no record of who has voted in support of that bill,” stated Bellucci. “Use of this method for HR 515 is a cowardly act.”
Please call the offices of House Speaker Paul Ryan at (202) 225-0600 and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy at (202) 225-4000 to let them know that HR 515 is controversial because it would require, for the first time in the nation’s history, “unique identifiers” to be added to the passports of American citizens.
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-114hr515eas/pdf/BILLS-114hr515eas.pdf Bill Senate Amendments Dec 17
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http://chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=398682 (Rep. Chris Smith)
http://www.majorityleader.gov/2016/02/01/house-passes-megans-law-to-keep-our-children-safe/ (Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy
http://cramer.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/cramer-house-approves-international-megans-law Rep. Cramer, ND
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/bill-make-harder-sex-offenders-travel-abroad-36649663
http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/02/house_passes_rep_smiths_international_megans_law.html
How can Smith say something like this? Is this supported by the bill language?
Thanks for your heads up. I caught the tail end of this. The gentleman from North Carolina made reference to Human Trafficking, following it up with anecdotal, heart wrenching examples in support. He, of course, neglects to realize that, by far, world wide, Human Trafficking involves forced labor.
The member from PA (CA?) makes reference to photos of the little girls exploited by this terrible practice of Human Trafficking. Is he talking about child human trafficking victims who are chained to their sewing machines to produce those $7.99 Jeans at WalMart?
Who was that woman from Missouri who got to speak? 4,500 RSO per year getting passports? OMG.
Chris Smith closing…. Megan Kanka is an angel. Earth to Chris Smith – angels are not real.
They keep brining up Megan Kanka. Megan Kanka was murdered. What does that have to do with 99.999% of the people on this web site?
I will not be sleeping tonight…
You can watch the proceedings of the House, live on http://houselive.gov/
I’m watch Rep. Chris Smith BSing the other members now.
Watching the proceedings was quite a shock, to see how they Lie to get what they want, many of the statements were just untrue.
Yes for sure provide Africa with electricity Mr Smith and Karen Bass while you ruin our families. and do not forget Ed Ross.
It’s also on Ch 350 if you have directv.
4:51:10 P.M.
H.R. 515 On motion that the House suspend the rules and agree to the Senate amendments Agreed to by voice vote.
4:51:11 P.M.
H.R. 515 Motion to reconsider laid on the table Agreed to without objection.
Last minute on the Floor regarding…
Feel free to send your warmest regards to Reps. Brendan Boyle, Robert Pittenger, Ann Wagner, and most of all, Chris Smith, for bringing us one step closer to concentration camps.
I am grateful for the coordinated effort among the various groups, and we all gave it our best shot, but I’m afraid our arguments fell on deaf ears. We are still too small and poor as a movement.
You can be certain our movement will be flooded with calls from panicking registrants, so maybe this will be the wake-up call for the hundreds of thousands who haven’t joined our ranks.
Is the ACLU really not involved at all in preparing lawsuits against this? Has the ACLU abandoned these issues?
What can be done to stop these laws growing at the federal level? It has to be more than just self-organizing, although that is important.
Where are the other criminal justice advocacy groups?
Take note of an equal protection argument. The bill, soon to become law, requires not only do you qualify under SORNA and have to register, but also you must have to register in a jurisdiction. So for instance, as a registrant for a misdemeanor in Washington, I do not have to register in Alaska, NM, or Texas, and a couple other states. Because I live in Washington, I will have Sex Offender stamped on my passport, but not if I lived in one of these states where I am not required to register.
The requirement to register varies from state to state and is not consistent.
Take note, for those who are lifetime registrants in California you have a little hope, if you are less than a tier 3 under SORNA, for eventually you will not be branded a sex offense on your passport once your 10/25 years expires.
As I said earlier in this thread, “Show me a single politician who will risk his or her “job” by doing the right thing and I’ll be impressed.” At the federal legislative level, it just isn’t going to happen. These people wouldn’t do the right thing unless there was money, votes, or power involved. To expect anything different is just ridiculous. You cannot count on elected people to do anything that could reflect negatively on them in a campaign ad. Can you imagine the attack ad on any member of Congress who would have voted to suppress this bill? They would get slaughtered. This has to get dealt with in the courts. My personal hope is that sooner or later, when all of these laws are dog-piled on top of each other, a challenge at the SC level will show itself. As a certain idiot once said, “This is no more difficult than renewing your membership at Price Club.” Okay, well, what if the Price Club I want to renew at is in the United Kingdom? Game over. This entire mess is unconstitutional. It always has been and it always will be. And when enough of it makes a heap that is impossible to ignore, we might -maybe- have a chance.
They keep bringing up Megan Kanka. Invoking is probably more correct. The child is no longer real, but a spirit of vengeance and the priests of this new religiosity are preaching at us in Congress.
I remember certain nuns teaching us children that everyone one of our little childhood misdemeanors helps to nail Jesus on the cross all over again. With that guilt stuck in our collective consciences, we were to accept the punishments metered out by the authorities in the Church, because they came from a long tradition of authoritarianism.
Now our government has been high jacked by this brand of religious belief. Anyone who ever transgresses one of the sexual laws, no matter how minor, is killing Miss Megan, Mr. Jacob, Miss Chelsea and the rest of the pantheon all over again. What shall we call this new super religion that all, Republicans and Democrats, liberal, conservative have signed onto with a devotion that overshadows reason and evidence? Kankaism? Victimism?
I think I am going to be sick.
A sad day indeed. I have been in mouning, of a sort, for my future dreams. I once dreamed to retire with the residual income that would fund a globe spaning lifestyle. On a private yacht. Nowwwww not so much. There goes that dream of writing a great American Novel on the high seas.
Oh well, I’m sure humanity is enriched by all kiddies around the world being spared my passage.
By the way a vigleante castrated me two years ago, but I’m sure there is a monster still bleeding inside somewhere. Boy am I glad the whole world is now protected from me.
On a side note once this makes waves in the legal profession and its known the Nazi’s did this. Well not to stereotype but I hear there are a lot of Jewish lawyers out there.
Just saying.
I just joined this potential lawsuit. I urge everyone to do their part. WE MUST FIGHT for our rights, our lives!
http://congress-courts-legislation.blogspot.com/2016/01/action-alert-challenging-international.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+CongressCourtsAndNationalLegislationccl+%28Congress%2C+Courts+and+National+Legislation+%28CCL%29%29
I think it’s time for me to bow out. I no longer will be able to join my family in Thailand. I can’t take the chance of being emotionally destroyed again by being denied entry after an axiety filled 16 hr. flight. I can’t put them through that either. Good luck to you all.
I just sent this to Chris Smith (had to use a 4th District NJ zip code to be able to send a comment to his Congressional website)
In re. HR 515:
Mr. Smith:, you a traitor to the Constitution and no better than a Nazi or communist Russian – the only other two societies which Branded the passports of it’s citizens. We will fight your unjust law (and we know it was passed just to add another funded bureaucracy that will financially benefit certain persons in your district). We know you know that it will not impact ‘sex trafficking’ because registered citizens do not travel for purposes of exploitation at any rate greater than the general population. You are a fraud. You are hurting good families, and you will have to live with that everyday of your life. I don’t want to think you are evil, but I truly do, knowing that you are keeping families apart when you KNOW this legislation is an absolute fraud. We will fight you with every legal means possible. This is not over.
This may not be the place to mention this, but has anyone else thought of asking John Oliver to do a piece on the insanity of sex offender laws?
He has done many fantastic exposes of the absurdity in our criminal justice system, and he regularly has hundreds and thousands of viewers.
I would send the idea myself, but I am taking involvement one slow step at a time. He would really be the ideal person to highlight the absurdity of all this – such as the non-relationship between sex trafficking, Megan Kanka, and the actual people on the registry.
PK, I do not mean disrespect, but please read the bill. Under SEC. 240. Unique passport identifiers for covered sex offenders, sex offender is defined as follows:
“(c) Defined terms.—In this section—
(1) the term ‘covered sex offender’ means an individual who—
(A) is a sex offender, as defined in section 4(f) of the International Megan’s Law to Prevent Child Exploitation and Other Sexual Crimes Through Advanced Notification of Traveling Sex Offenders; and
(B) is currently required to register under the sex offender registration program of any jurisdiction;”
Before they can brand your passport that means you must be an offender under SORNA (Adam Walsh) AND be required to register in your state. SORNA requirements expire for Tier I and II after some fixed time (10 and 25 years respectively). Therefore, even if you register in CA for life, after 10 years for a Tier I offender you do not qualify under SORNA. See 42 USC 16915.
One can argue that Congress has spoken and this overrules the administrative agency and how they are doing it now. So if this law stands, at least for some there is an eventual release from the branding.
? Wow. Welcome to the new United States of Nazi Amerika!
(And I just got my brand new passport in September. Guess that’s $140 flushed down the federal toilet. Sure hope it “saves one child”, so he or she can grow up to be on a government registry.)
My death sentence is about to be signed. Can you kill yourself if someone else has already taken your life?
I would like to ask if there is evidence that a single registrant, a person on the registry, has been convicted of sex trafficking on an international level. That is a very serious allegation, but one I think without merit. It is amazing that politicians can say anything and there is no accountability. I think that our ONLY hope is to organize and fight these laws on the Federal level. I am contributing by the month to the RTAG but if there was an organized effort to challenge the registry itself I would surely contribute again because we will never get relief if we wait on politicians to vote on bills that will remove the registry or to substantially to reduce it.
How about the next national conference be held at:
Hilton Garden Inn Hamilton – 800 US Highway 130, Hamilton Township, NJ 08691.
Chrissy Smith’s home town. Get 10,000 RSO to show up for a weekend and flood his town. Say we would of held the convention in France but we couldn’t get there due to your bill.
And in NJ you don’t have to check in I believe unless you are there 10 days or more. So now you have 10,000 RC in his small town, we can all visit him. Bring him his own Nazi General Uniform.
Sorry that was all very petty.
Paul,
You are correct that each jurisdiction determines the length of actual registration, however they do not define Tier offenses under Adam Walsh. Look at 42 USC 16911 for definitions. Any offense that is punishable for less than a year in jail is a Tier I under Federal SORNA. California may require registration for life but SORNA does not. We need to properly understand these statutes before we can fight them.
The new bill refers to registration requirements under federal SORNA and in one instance ANDs that requirement to register in your state before allowing the branding of your passport. So what I said in earlier posts was correct. There are still Constitutional claims here which should be pursued, but we need to fully understand these statutes before we can fight effectively them.
Janice / Team ,
Can you give us all direction on what to do over the next 10 days ? I think everyone is in a state of panic right now , understandably so but the worse thing we can do is give up. Please stay united and wait to hear from Janice and Team on what we need to do now.
Jason, note what the Sixth Circuit ruled (which the Supreme Court has a similar case on the docket for this year regarding registering while abroad)
“But Congress did not give SORNA extraterritorial effect, see 42 U.S.C. 16911(10), and when a sex offender leaves the country, he no longer poses an immediate threat to the safety of children in the United States. The government asserts no policy interest under SORNA in monitoring the offender’s subsequent movements among foreign jurisdictions. See National Guidelines, 73 Fed. Reg. at 38, 066 (“A sex offender who moves to a foreign country may pass beyond the reach of U.S. jurisdictions and hence may not be subject to any enforceable registration requirement under U.S. law unless and until he or she returns to the United States.”).” United States v. Lunsford, 12-3616 (8th Cir. 08/05/2013)
According to this Circuit, once you leave the US you do not need to notify anyone. Lets see if the SCOTUS agrees with this.
Note Article 13, section 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations declares “Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each State.” Section 2 of Article 13 states : “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” This should be part of the argument that IML interferes with ones right of freedom of movement protected by the US Constitution and the United Nations.
Perhaps the branding of passports was a blessing in disguise, for it seems like that will not stand in the courts. Even if it does, it wont matter given you will not need a passport anyway. This may be the straw that breaks the camels back.
Last year Washington State passed SB-5154, which codified the requirement to provide twenty-one days notice before leaving the country. I asked the ACLU to get involved but they declined, so I initiated a pro se law suite in Superior Court last summer when the law became effective. We go to trial in May and are in the deposition phase right now.
However I do have an appeal into the State Supreme Court right now on the issue of a temporary injunction. The ruling on this interlocutory appeal will be interesting to see how the Court addresses the issue of travel and freedom of movement. The Court has historically granted strong protections for this under the State Constitution and I am just hoping they will rule the right to travel internationally is a strong protected right.
The ACLU in the Washington State is worthless and I dropped my membership. They pick and chose their cases based on politics I think, not on violations of human rights. Given that, you can only rely on yourself to fight this. If the Court rules against me and makes bad law because I am not a sophisticated lawyer, then it makes no difference to me. The outcome for me would be no different than how I started. I say more pro se legal action and clog the system with law suites.