Martin Austermuhle
A group of D.C. voting rights activists are protesting Republican Arizona Rep. Trent Franks’ Glendale district office this afternoon over legislation he’s introduced on the Hill that would prohibit abortions in the District after 20 weeks.
The protest—which pleads of Franks not to be a “wiener”—was coordinated by D.C. voting rights advocacy group DC Vote, but the protesters are locals who have expressed concern over the extent of the legislation introduced in January. (Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee introduced a similar version of the legislation last month.) According to Ilir Zherka, DC Vote’s executive director, the issue isn’t necessarily abortion, but rather that Franks is using his position to legislate for D.C. residents.
“As Arizona residents continue to struggle economically, Rep. Franks is spending time in Washington infringing on D.C.’s local autonomy instead of focusing on the concerns of his constituents,” said Ilir Zherka, Executive Director of DC Vote, in a statement.
“How can Franks call himself an advocate of ‘limited government,’ while at the same time call for increased federal control over 620,000 Americans in the nation’s capital who are denied basic democratic rights and voting representation in Congress? We join the demonstrators today in demanding that Franks withdraw his bill and focus on Arizona instead,” said Zherka.
Abortion in D.C. remains a wedge issue that’s constantly used on the Hill to limit D.C. budget and legislative autonomy. After Democrats relaxed restrictions on the use of local funds for abortions when they ruled the House, in 2011 the new Republican leadership reinstated prohibitions on local money going to pay for the procedures. Last year President Obama even used the issue to wrangle a last-minute budget deal out of Speaker of the House John Boehner; more recently, a proposed bill that would give D.C. budget autonomy would further codify the restrictions on the use of local funds for abortions.
This isn’t the first time that D.C. voting rights have taken their fight to congressional districts. In 2006, advocates traveled to Montana to try and pressure Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT). They’ve also used allies to target Rep. Travis Childers (D-MS), who tried to attach an amendment to a D.C. voting rights bill that would have gutted the city’s gun laws. In 2010, Shadow Rep. Mike Panetta used the Free and Equal D.C. Fund, a political action he created, to buy ads and support candidates for office that sided with D.C. voting rights.
