WASHINGTON — Videos appealing to a sexual fetish by showing women killing small animals will be banned under a bill that cleared the Senate yesterday and is heading to President Obama for his signature.
The voice vote in the Senate followed a vote in the House Monday to ban what has been called crush videos, which depict the abuse and killing of animals.
Congress banned such videos in 1999, but the Supreme Court struck down the law this year, saying it was too broadly written and violated First Amendment protections.
The more narrowly crafted bill makes it a crime to sell or distribute videos that violate bans on animal cruelty by showing animals being burned, drowned, suffocated, or impaled.
Crush videos typically show women, often barefoot or wearing high heels, stomping small animals to death.
Every state bans animal cruelty, but it has been difficult to apply those laws to crush videos because they often do not show faces, dates, or locations. The legislation makes interstate sale of such videos a crime.
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