The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) has said that one jurisdiction’s struggle to pay for the $150,000 associated with investigating and taking to trial a well-known hate crime murder in Laramie, Wyoming in 1998 resulted in the sheriff's department laying off five deputies.  This is where the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, which is also known as H.R. 3355, the VCCLEA, and the Biden Crime Law, is helpful.   In part, this law established funds for rural crime task forces, which helps law enforcement in particularly poorly funded areas of the country.  We want to be clear here, however:   The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 does not provide extra resources to help law enforcement officials investigate or prosecute hate crime defendants.  H.R. 3355 merely established enhanced sentencing for hate crimes.  On September 27, 2007, the Senate voted 60-39 to attach S.Amdt. 3035 (sponsored by Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy) to H.R. 1585 (the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008).  S.Amdt. 3035 called for the provision of Federal assistance to States, local jurisdictions, and Indian tribes to prosecute hate crimes, but because it was attached to a controversial defense spending bill, the amendment never made its way into law (President George W. Bush vetoed HR 1585).  All 39 senators who voted against S.Amdt. 3035 were Republicans (only eight Republicans voted for it, and John McCain did not vote).  So while there is a desperate need for local law enforcement to have more resources than they now do to combat hate crimes, there is no federal law at this time that helps alleviate that need.