Rand Paul holds up anti-lynching legislation as he seeks changes to bill – By Ted Barrett and Clare Foran (CNN) / June 3 2020
(CNN)Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky said Wednesday he is holding up popular bipartisan legislation to make lynching a federal crime, a long-sought goal of supporters that is acutely relevant now against the backdrop of nationwide protests against police mistreatment of African Americans.
“We want the bill to be stronger,” Paul told reporters on Capitol Hill. “We think that lynching is an awful thing that should be roundly condemned and should be universally condemned.”
He addressed the problems he sees with the bill, which passed the House in February on a 410-4 vote and that Senate supporters hoped to pass by unanimous consent until he objected.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to conflate someone who has an altercation, where they had minor bruises, with lynching. We think that’s a disservice to those who were lynched in our history, who continue to have, we continue to have these problems. And I think it’s a disservice to have a new 10-year penalty for people who have minor bruising. We’ve tried to exclude that part from the bill, and we’ve been working with the authors to try to make the bill better,” Paul said.
Continue to article: https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/03/politics/rand-paul-lynching-legislation/index.html
