Senate Passes Historic Bro Law
The Aid Vote That Wasn't | Ice-Out Lessons | Pawpaws
SENATE PASSES BRO LAW by Peter Glenshaw
March 15, 2025
Washington, DC – As expected, the US Senate voted today to approve new a bill that would codify male parental and sexual responsibility for unwanted pregnancies.
Known popularly as the "Bro Law," the legislation brought forth strong opinions from Senators in favor of, and opposed, to the legislation during today’s debate in the U.S. Capitol.
The final vote was not close. 89 senators voted in favor of the law, formally known as “The Male Sexual Responsibility Act of 2025.”
“Today’s vote marks an important step in the fight for sexual health equality and parental responsibility,” said Senate Majority Leader Patty Murray (D-WA).
“When U.S. Supreme Court repealed 50 years of women's reproductive rights in 2022 (Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization), it became incumbent upon this legislative body to address the lightly regulated and poorly understood behavior of men, and their sexual and parental responsibility,” said Sen. Murray. "It's a problem that dates back thousands of years and it's high time we did something about it."
According to its supporters, the Bro Law will make men responsible for the consequences of their sexual activity, especially when it results in an unwanted pregnancy or where the male fails to take responsibility for a child he helped create.
“The latest data show about 600,000 abortions occur in the United States. The number of unplanned pregnancies is 10x that amount (6.0M). In fact nearly half of all American pregnancies are unplanned,” said Sen. Murray.
“We also know that data measuring the percentage of fathers who acknowledge paternity is very thin and not widely collected. In Texas, 30% of families lack paternity acknowledgement. In Minnesota, the percent of fathers not named on the birth certificate has increased from 7.5% in 2003 to 11.2 in 2019. The real question is why we are so focused on women, pregnancy and childbirth when we know virtually nothing about men and their willingness to accept of paternal responsibility," she added.
Under the Bro Law, a name of a man who fathers a child must appear on the child's birth certificate, and that father must meet his financial and parental responsibilities for the child within six months of birth.
Failure to do carries a $100,000 fine and a mandatory six-month jail sentence, on the first offense. Repeat offenders face up to three years in jail and, in some cases, a court-ordered vasectomy.
The penalties are more severe for men who commit sexual crimes.
Under the Bro Law, any male convicted of rape or sexual assault will have one testicle surgically removed, in addition to serving mandatory jail time. A second conviction will result in forced sterilization.
“The male-dominated Supreme Court made it clear that life begins at conception. We also know conception cannot occur without a male injecting his sperm into a woman,” said Sen. Murray.
“If that pregnancy occurs without responsibility on the part of the male (and we all know what a male is, right, Senator Blackburn?), then the Bro Law holds men accountable for their actions,” she said.
During the debate, proponents of the bill were passionate in their support.
“I am tired of men using their member without consequences. It’s time to police the penis,” said Senator Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY).
Senator Taylor Swift (D-TN) said: “It was time, and really way beyond time, for men to be treated as equals to women when it comes parental responsibility and sexual behavior.”
Opponents of the Bro Law were outraged at its passage.
“It’s my body. If I want grab someone by the pussy, why should anyone care?” said Senator Donald Trump, Jr. (R-FL). “It seems like a double standard. Dad did it for years, right? And he became President,” he said.
Other anti-Bro legislators noted that many presidents, including Bill Clinton and John Kennedy, engaged in extra-marital affairs while in office. They also noted that six presidents appear to have fathered children out-of-wedlock.
However vocal the opposition, the outcome of today's vote was never in doubt; Opponents of the Bro Law are in the distinct minority. The Senate is firmly controlled by women, thanks to the Great Gender Transition of 2024.
That year the Senate flipped from a legislative body with 76 male senators to one with 80 female senators. Public outrage over the Dobbs decision that effectively made abortion a crime led to an unprecedented wave of resignations among incumbent, male senators. Nearly every male Senator who voted to confirm Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court was voted out of office or retired in 2024.
That year also saw a wave of well-known women elected to Senate seats previously held by men. Sen. Swift (D-TN) and Sen. Tina Fey (D-PA) won open seats, while Sen. Katy Perry (R-KY) beat Sen. Mitch McConnell, who was first elected in 1985—a year after Perry's birth.
The only female senator to vote against the Bro Law was Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN).
“I’ve long protected the rights of men,” she said.
“The Fair Pay Act. The Violence Against Women Act. Why stop now?,” she added.
The next stop for the Bro Law is the desk of President Oprah Winfrey, who is expected to sign the legislation in the coming week.
THE AID VOTE THAT WASN'T by David Eaton
Mitch McConnell, the Senate Minority Leader, and three of his fellow Republican senators met with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv last Saturday. The meeting came a mere two days after McConnell's republican colleague and fellow Kentuckian, Sen. Rand Paul, blocked passage of $40 billion in aid for Ukraine.
You likely saw or read some of the coverage of McConnell's trip; it was hard to miss. What was not hard to miss was the disparate way media outlets treated the GOP senators' visit in the context of the aid bill that failed due to objection by of one of their own.
“GOP lawmakers visit Kyiv as Europe readies new alliances” - Washington Post
“McConnell and other Republican senators make a secret visit to Ukraine” - New York Times
“McConnell heads to Kyiv and becomes the latest U.S. official to meet with Zelensky” - NPR
None of these national outlets mentioned the aid vote in the headline or sub-head. The first mention of the aid package and vote in the Post’s piece came six paragraphs in. It took another two to grafs for the reporter to explain why the vote had failed. The Times mentioned the failed vote in the next to last paragraph of its story. NPR metioned it in the third graf—“a hold-up in the Senate”—without explaining who was doing the holding up or why. Readers had to link to another piece for that bit of editorial context.
The AP story carried a fairly utilitarian headline—“McConnell, GOP senators meet Zelenskyy in surprise Kyiv stop”—and no mention of Thursday’s failed aid vote. None.
McConnell and his colleagues received cursory treatment from the Wall Street Journal’s headline writers—four words in the sub-head—though the actual description of the visit was thorough and complete, with an explanation of Thursday’s failed aid vote…. But only if you read the preceding 19 paragraphs.
Bloomberg offered yet another generic take with its headline: “McConnell, GOP Senators Meet With Ukraine’s Zelenskiy in Kyiv.” It was, however, the only story I came across that put the failed aid vote right at the top, in the sub-head—“Senate effort to pass $40 billion Ukraine aid package held up”—with context provided in the final graf of the (very) short piece.
Six outlets with six different approaches to covering McConnell's visit and the failed Ukraine aid vote. The Wall Street Journal's story was the most thorough and contextual, but you had to plow through 19 grafs to get that context. The AP simply ignored the aid vote altogether.
And, for what it's worth, none of the coverage of McConnell's visit mentioned he and his three Republican traveling companions all voted not to hold former President Donald Trump accountable for attempting to extort information from President Zelensky in exchange for hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid.
All of which serves as a reminder that where we get our news matters as much as how those outlets choose to cover and present it. A diverse media diet is about the only way to find balance and learn enough to have informed opinions and make informed choices. This is why Peter and I try to present a variety of sources and source material in this newsletter—to help us all maintain Perspective.
BRIEFS:
Thawing Pond in Acadia National Park: Photo by Trevor Hayes on Unsplash
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ICYMI:
A couple of weeks ago, we wrote about an Ipsos poll that asked people in 31 countries, including the US, about climate change and their personal willingness to make lifestyle changes to help stave off #climatedisaster. The single biggest change any of us can make is to leave our cars in the garage or driveway, drive less and walk, cycle or take public transportation. Recognizing the future does not lie in building more freeways, officials in California recently stopped work on a proposed $6 billion freeway widening project in Los Angeles County, and pledged to devote billions to mass transit and improving existing roadways. But not everyone was happy with the decision, and organized labor led the way. This quote from Andrew Meredith of the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California caught our attention for its remarkable level of tone-deafness: “The idea that we’re displacing people that are living close to the highways, this is natural in the terms of the way development happens. Infrastructure sometimes has to come first. If we made decisions completely based on the impacts on relatively small amounts of people, nothing would ever get done.” Infrastructure over people? Really, that’s the binary choice we have. Seems a bit, ah, narrow. You can read the full Los Angeles Times piece here.