Amber Alert Turns Into Political Football in D.C.

[Rob-TheStormChaser]

National elation over reuniting Elizabeth Smart with her family mutated into nasty partisan politics in the nation's capital Thursday, as congressional leaders and Ed Smart exchanged fire over progress of anti-abduction legislation.
Smart incited a congressional backlash when, in a national television interview with missing child activist and "America's Most Wanted" host John Walsh, he stepped up his verbal lashing of House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner and House Majority Leader Tom DeLay for refusing to advance the Amber legislation to help create and coordinate child abduction alerts using TV, radio and highway condition billboard messages.
"The Amber Alert needs to come to the floor right now; [kidnapped] children out there do not have time and he needs to know that," Ed Smart said during Walsh's nationally syndicated television talk show Thursday. "Jim, you will be held responsible. The blood of the children will be on your head."
Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., rejected Smart's call for an immediate vote on the House floor for the Senate-passed Amber Alert bill, saying it would make no significant changes in the current kidnap notification system.
He has refused to place the bill on his committee's calendar in favor of more sweeping and controversial legislation he has authored that must go back to the Senate for consideration if it passes the House.
"For the protection of our children, we need to have these provisions as well as a properly drafted Amber Alert," Sensenbrenner said at a Capitol Hill news conference he called to rebut Smart's charges. "It is better to do it right the first time rather than doing something that is not what people anticipate is going to happen."
With Sensenbrenner was Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, a member of the committee.
Sensenbrenner's irritation with Smart's continued criticism was evidenced when one of his staff members physically removed an aide to Rep. Martin Frost, D-Texas, the co-author of the Amber Alert legislation, from the House Judiciary hearing room where the news conference was held.
The congressional aide was ousted for handing reporters a three-paragraph statement from Smart that Sensenbrenner "seems to be exhibiting reckless disregard for not only his constituents but children throughout the country." Smart's statement also said Sensenbrenner had refused repeated requests from the Smart family to meet with him to explain the need for the Amber Alert bill, but "he has declined because 'he does not want to politicize the issue.' "
In an odd rebuke, Smart's lambasting of GOP leaders for blocking the Amber legislation drew a reprimand from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
"I happened to feel very bad when he chose to direct his anger to Capitol Hill," said Robbie Callaway, chairman of the board of the national organization based in Alexandria, Va. "The system did fail Ed Smart, make no mistake. God bless you Ed and we share in your joy, but the problem is not here on Capitol Hill."
House Democrats sided with Smart and say the problem lies with GOP House leadership.
"With all due respect to Congressman Sensenbrenner, Ed Smart is not misinformed about protecting children," said Frost, who Thursday filed a "discharge petition" with the House in an attempt to wrest the Amber Alert bill from Sensenbrenner's control. "Our bipartisan legislation would strengthen Amber Alerts, and it would be the law of the land today, except it is caught up in Chairman Sensenbrenner's much more complicated and controversial bill."
The political strategy at play with the Amber Alert bill is as old as the Trojan horse. Legislation that enjoys broad bipartisan support is stuffed with other less-popular measures in the hopes the core intent of the bill will carry the additional provisions through the gates of the legislative process. Sensenbrenner's bill tacks onto the original measure expansion of the death penalty and wiretapping authority, elimination of the statute of limitations on sex abuse cases, criminalization of traveling with criminal intent, and other changes.
"It should be clear that Chairman Sensenbrenner is only using the tremendous popularity of the Amber Alert legislation to try to force approval of his own divisive proposals by the Senate," said Jenni Thompson of the Polly Klaas Foundation. "Senate sponsors have made clear that they will reject Sensenbrenner's provisions, just as they did last year."
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, pushed the Amber-only bill through the Senate in just two days earlier this year, and he and Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, joined Senate sponsors Thursday in calling for immediate House passage.
Although Cannon is an original co-sponsor of the Amber-only bill in the House, he broke with Hatch and Bennett.
"Mr. Smart wants a bill that makes Amber mandatory, and the Senate bill does not do that," Cannon said. "I'd compliment [Sensenbrenner], who has been a champion of this issue for as long as I've known him, and I believe we will get a better bill."
DeLay, R-Texas, said House GOP leaders have put the Sensenbrenner bill on an "accelerated" schedule for a House floor vote in about two weeks.
Responded Smart: "This is clearly an issue that cannot wait one day longer. Each day costs a life."

[sunny shine]

There should be no debate nor an issue concerning the Amber Alert. It is a system that works.

[j]

There should be no debate nor an issue concerning the Amber Alert. It is a system that works.

yes indeed sunny....a no brainer IMO

[firefighter16]

Without the alert no one would know what or who to look for.

Deffinate no brainer.

[Rob-TheStormChaser]

It worked here twice and I see them always installing the mobile signs along the interstates and the ones overhead for safety and practical purposes.

[JQ Public]

they definitly need to get moving on this legislation.