D.C. child marriages have increased. This new bill wants to end them
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A new bill aims to end child marriages in D.C. after a recent uptick in the practice.
Why it matters: D.C. allows 16- and 17-year-olds to get married with permission from a parent or guardian but has no legal safeguards — such as a residency requirement or age-gap limit — to ensure such marriages are consensual and to rule out coercion.
- Advocates warn that parents can also utilize child marriages for trafficking or hiding statutory rape, per a Tahirih Justice Center report.
The big picture: D.C. is an outlier in the mid-Atlantic, where all states have recently taken steps to limit or end child marriage — a practice that occurs when one of the married parties, usually a girl, is under 18, per UNICEF.
- This puts D.C. "at risk of becoming a regional destination for child exploitation and human trafficking under the guise of marriage," says the Tahirih report.
While child marriage isn't common in the District, the city has seen a recent uptick: Fifteen D.C. minors got married last year, up from one minor in 2022.
- Councilmember Brooke Pinto argued in a letter introducing the legislation that this uptick could be the result of nearby people traveling to D.C. for these marriages after states like Virginia and Maryland passed restrictions.
Driving the news: The D.C. Council introduced the Child Marriage Prohibition Amendment Act of 2024 last month, which aims to make 18 the age of consent for D.C. marriage and to restrict anyone under 18 from getting a marriage license, without exceptions.
- At a council hearing for the bill Monday, local survivors of child marriage testified about their experiences.
What they're saying: "No child should ever have to endure that unimaginable heavy load of raw pain. The years I spent in the marriage — if you can even call it that — were the most painful years of my life," wrote child marriage survivor Aliya Abbas in a testimony submitted for Monday's hearing.
- "[The bill aims] to let a child remain a child and experience a complete, healthy, secure and vibrant life as they should with respect, love, dignity, self-worth, choices and freedom."
State of play: 41 children got married in D.C. between 2012 and 2020, and the majority of them married adults, per D.C. Superior Court data listed in Tahirih's report.
- Several of the people married were over a decade apart in age, and one child married an adult over twice their age.
Between the lines: Getting married as a child means you're 50% more likely to drop out of high school and 31% more likely to one day live in poverty, per Tahirih's report.
- Plus: Studies suggest women who get married under 18 have higher odds of mental health and medical problems.
Zoom out: Child marriage is still legal in 37 states.
- Senators Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) introduced federal legislation in August to create a commission dedicated to ending child marriage in the U.S., incentivize states to outlaw the practice and ban it from happening on federal land or property.
What we're watching: The bill is currently under Council review.
- Should the Council sign off on it, it would go before Mayor Muriel Bowser and Congress for approval.