By: Miriam Edelman
DCNOW is pleased that the D.C. Council recently passed B25-0955, the Child Marriage Prohibition Amendment Act of 2024. This piece follows up on DCNOW’s posts, entitled “Child Marriage Prohibition Amendment Act of 2024” and “DCNOW Joins The D.C. Coalition to End Child Marriage.”
According to bill sponsor Brooke Pinto, child marriage is a growing problem in the nation’s capital. As the graph shows below, the rate of child marriage have increased from two minors being married in 2020 to 15 minors being married in 2023. Introducing the bill, she wrote,
This big uptick in 2023 could be a result of nearby states passing their own reforms, leading the District to become a destination for child marriage. Maryland and Virginia, both passed child marriage prohibition legislation within the past two years, highlighting the crucial need for the District to enact similar legislation swiftly.
On October 21, 2024, the D.C. Council’s Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety held a hearing regarding this bill and other pieces of legislation. Some of DCNOW’s allies and child marriage survivors testified. As Sara Tasneem said,
At fifteen years old I was forced to marry a stranger who was 13 years older than me. I was legally married to my rapist and abuser at the age of 16 and clearly pregnant — which was evidence of rape. As a minor, I faced extreme and numerous barriers to being able to leave my abusive marriage. Sadly, I am not the exception. It has taken me years to recognize and address the severe impacts child marriage has had on me, including PTSD from the prolonged abuse, recovering from the financial abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, and physical abuse, the educational impacts of being taken out of school as a fifteen-year-old led directly to extreme poverty.
Vilas Wright, who had to marry a man who was twice her age, said, “No one asked me. No one stopped it. No one stood up and questioned if this was right or wrong. You have the power to do that today.” She added,
I never attended high school. I was not able to get a job because I had no training and was not old enough to be hired. I survived by trading my body for shelter and food. After all, it seemed to carry no other value. The consequences of the events of my childhood will remain with me for the duration of my lifetime.
On November 25, 2024, the D.C. Council’s Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety held a mark-up, when the committee passed the bill by a vote of 3 Yes, 0 No, 0 Absent, 0 Abstained, 0 Present, 0 Recused, 0 Vacant, and 0 Other. On December 3, 2024, the full D.C. Council passed the bill (First Reading) by a vote of 11 Yes and two Absent. On December 17, 2024, the full D.C. Council passed the bill (Second Reading) by a vote of 13 to 0. With the second vote, the D.C. Council joins 13 state legislatures that passed a child marriage prohibition since 2016.
Before the bill becomes law, it goes to D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and then to Congress. DCNOW requests that Bowser approve the child marriage bill and that Congress not interfere with the bill if it gets to Congressional review. Child marriage violates the rights of girls and women. It must end in the nation’s capital. If the child marriage bill does not become law, then the District of Columbia could continue to be a “destination site” for this harmful practice, as Tahirih Justice Center has warned. As the Center wrote in 2023,
We have consistently seen that when one state strengthens child marriage laws, people will seek to skirt the law by taking children to nearby jurisdictions where they can still be married. This played out here in the DMV region when Virginia passed a law in 2016; the next year Maryland saw an uptick in Virginia-resident minors marrying. With Maryland passing its own law last year, D.C. could become the regional destination for child marriage.
Some Members of Congress would like to end child marriage. On August 1, 2024, Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL) introduced S.4990 - Child Marriage Prevention Act of 2024, which would “comprehensively combat child marriage in the United States.” Senators Brian Schatz (D-HI) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) co-sponsored the bill. In a press release announcing the introduction of the bill, Durbin said, “Child marriage is a significant problem domestically, and it overwhelmingly affects underage girls who are married to adult men, often with dire consequences for their life outcomes. This loss of dignity and independence is unacceptable.”
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