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Senate votes to open debate on anti-Asian American hate crimes bill
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IANS | 15 Apr, 2021
The US Senate has voted with sweeping bipartisan support to open a
debate on an anti-Asian American hate crimes bill, clearing a key hurdle
to its final passage vote in the chamber.
The evenly-split
Senate late Wednesday voted 92-6 to move forward debating on the
Covid-19 Hate Crimes Act, a bill drafted by Democrats that intended to
speed up administrative processing of hate crimes, which the Asian
American community has seen a skyrocketing surge during the pandemic,
reports Xinhua news agency.
"I'm so glad that our Republican
colleagues have voted with us to proceed with this legislation. This was
never intended as gotcha legislation. It was always intended as
bipartisan legislation," Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer said
after the vote.
Under the bill, the Justice Department would be
required to designate an official to review pandemic-related hate
crimes, as well as to coordinate with local law enforcement and
community-based groups to facilitate and raise awareness about hate
crimes reporting.
The bill would also call on the federal
administration to offer guidance on "best practices to mitigate racially
discriminatory language" describing the coronavirus pandemic.
Schumer
and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell have started negotiating a
deal on amendments to the bill, local media reported, noting the first
amendment vote is expected to be on a bipartisan bill called No Hate
Act, which aimed to improve the reporting of hate crimes, beef up hate
crimes training for law enforcement and set up a hate crimes hotline.
Schumer
said on Wednesday that there was bipartisan interest in moving forward
with such an amendment, adding he and McConnell are making "good
progress" on reaching a deal on "sensible, germane and constructive
amendments".
Without a deal, the Senate debate over the bill could easily stretch into next week.
Democratic
Senator Mazie Hirono, who introduced the legislation, said on Wednesday
that in total about 20 amendments have been filed so far, though some
of them "have absolutely nothing to do with the bill".
"We're
working with the Republican leader to determine if and how many other
amendments to the bill there will be, so that we can consider them and
vote on final passage without any gotcha or not-germane amendments,"
said Hirono.
Some Republican senators criticised that Democrats
had advanced the bill directly to the Senate floor without going through
committee first.
They also expressed concerns that the bill's focus on Covid-related hate crimes might be too narrow.
According
to Stop AAPI Hate, a California-based non-profit social organization
tracking incidents of violence against Asian Americans and Pacific
Islanders during the pandemic, it received nearly 3,800 reports of
attack or abuse between March 2020 and February 2021.
Protesters
took to the streets in more than 60 cities across the US after the
shootings killing six Asian American women and two others in Atlanta in
March.
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