Crime

During its final session of the 114th Congress, the Senate passed the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crimes Reauthorization Act of 2016 (S.2854/H.R.5067). In the Senate, the bill was led by Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC), Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), and Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO). In the House, original sponsors were Rep. John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI), Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) and Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI). The bill now heads to the President to be signed into law.

BACKGROUND

Today, House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) joined Democratic Whip Steny H. Hoyer (D-MD), House Foreign Affairs Committee Ranking Member Eliot Engel (D-NY), House Homeland Security Committee Ranking Member Bennie G.

Mr. Speaker, in June of 2007, this body passed and the President subsequently signed the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crimes Act. Since that time, the Department of Justice and cold case advocates have reviewed hundreds of cases in a search for justice and a sense of closure for the families of those who fell victim to racial violence in one of the most tumultuous periods of this nation's history.

Today, the U.S. House of Representatives passed S. 2854/ H.R. 5067, the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crimes Reauthorization Act. The Till bill's primary purpose is to provide federal resources to local jurisdictions in the resolution of civil rights era cold cases. This reauthorization represents a recommitment to the original goals of the bill as well as the strengthening and clarification of the law, as called for by interested civil rights groups and families.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) and Ranking Member John Conyers (D-Mich.) joined C-SPAN Newsmakers to discuss the bipartisan Policing Strategies Working Group and the Committee's efforts to reform our nation's criminal justice system.

After President-elect Donald Trump's vague announcement this morning to leave his "…great business in total...," all sixteen Democratic members of the House Judiciary Committee wrote today to Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) to request that the Committee hold hearings to examine the federal conflicts-of-interest and ethics provisions that may apply to the President of the United States.