2012 Primary Election Results

Congress should pass legislation providing adequate conscience protections for religious institutions, including those that employ or serve people who are not of their own faith, so they will not be required to provide insurance coverage for contraception, abortifacients, and sterilization in conflict with their religious beliefs.

The federal Defense of Marriage Act should be upheld and federal law should continue to define marriage as a legal union exclusively between one man and one woman.

Congress should pass legislation to permanently apply the longstanding policy of the Hyde Amendment, which restricts federal funding of abortion and of health plans covering abortion, to govern all funds authorized or appropriated by the federal government.

Undocumented immigrants who have been living in the United States for a number of years and who do not have criminal records should be able to earn legal status by registering with the government, paying fines and back taxes, agreeing to learn English, and get in the back of the line in order to embark on a just path to citizenship.

Congress should reform the family-based immigration system to expedite legal U.S. entry for children, siblings, and spouses of U.S. citizens and U.S. permanent residents.

Congress should address the federal deficit by requiring a shared sacrifice by all, including raising adequate revenues, eliminating unnecessary military and other spending, and addressing the long-term costs of health insurance and retirement programs fairly without imposing disproportionate cuts to programs that serve the poor.

Congress should help poor and vulnerable families by funding the National Housing Trust Fund and by opposing efforts to increase the rents paid by poor families receiving public assistance.

Congress should maintain current levels of poverty-focused development assistance to reduce global poverty and increase the percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) contributed in foreign aid.

The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, which provides scholarships to low-income students in the District of Columbia to attend the school that best fits their needs, should be funded to allow current and new students to participate.

The reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act should continue the longstanding policy of providing educational benefits to students and teachers in private and religious schools on a basis equitable to those received by public school students and teachers.