A rape kit is "is a package of items used by medical personnel for gathering and preserving physical evidence following an allegation of sexual assault."

After praising each other for "reaching across the aisle," Rep. Mace remarked this legislation is needed because "state and local law enforcement agencies sometimes lack the resources or lack the organization to be able" to address the backlog of rape kits. (There are, supposedly, "more than a hundred thousand" untested rape kits across the country.) Rep. Lee then made a dubious claim: "1 in 5 women are victims of rape or attempted rape. And the numbers are even higher for women of color." She might as well have just said that all men are beasts and potential rapists.

Rep. Lee further explained that their bill "doesn't provide any new funds to state, but it conditions the use of what we send already—the Byrne JAG funds—on following a simple reporting requirement."

Shapiro brought up a good point, even if he does not believe its premise: "We so often hear that law enforcement is not national. It is state and local." The response of Reps. Lee and Mace was that although their states were addressing the issue, they still needed the support and help of Congress.

Law enforcement is indeed a state and local matter. What James Madison wrote in Federalist No. 45 is just as true today as it was when he penned it in 1788: "The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the Federal Government, are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State Governments are numerous and indefinite."