The 100-Year Fight to Pass the Equal Rights Amendment Gets a New Push

We are here today because we believe it is time for Congress to affirm the Equal Rights Amendment as the 28th Amendment to the Constitution and we are organizing Congress by launching this group to ensure that

equal

ity is enshrined in the supreme law of our land for so long. we have been erased or relegated to a footnote in history and so I hope that this representation, this demonstration here today of a truly multiracial, multigenerational Coalition, affirms that there will no longer be Erasure, the Equal Rights Amendment or the era is a United States Constitutional Amendment that guarantees

equal

protection under the law to people of all genders and sexual orientations.

The caucus of the era introduced by Representatives Bush and Presley will be the first of its kind. This movement to

pass

the Equal Rights Amendment is one that is being led by focusing on women and people of color who were originally excluded from the writing of the United States Constitution, so this caucus allows us a vehicle to affirm that the

fight

to

pass

the era is alive and well, it is relevant, it is necessary and it is timely, especially In this moment when we continue to see so many legislative attacks against the

rights

of women and our lgbtq brothers, there are many direct ways in which era will improve the lives of women and people of other genders in this country, so we think about educational inequality.

When Congress passed Title IX in 1972, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any educational program or anyone receiving federal assistance, we knew that despite significant advances for women, women of color have not been equally benefited from the benefits of Title IX, we know that black girls do. a 12 school suspension rate compared to a two percent suspension rate for white girls, here's how we would make that change when we look at the gender pay gap, the era could be used as an anchor to pass better laws, better laws that focus on enforcement Wage provisions we can talk about health care Discrimination based on sex prevents many people from accessing health care in the United States, so with the era Congress could set benchmarks for increases in health insurance coverage for women of color and we cannot forget about reproductive freedom. protect our basic right to abortion care and those are just a few of the things the era was first introduced in Congress in 1923.

Throughout its 100-

year

history, the

amendment

has been the subject of many legal battles Although it reached the 38-state threshold required for ratification, the era has been halted by a congressional deadline set in the 1970s. Representatives Bush and Presley are introducing legislation to overcome this barrier. The women of this country have done our job. states have done their job and now Congress must do their job and eliminate In this arbitrary deadline I hear from opponents of the era that we don't need the era because we already have laws in place to protect us and that's why I have to ask who is that who is because I need those protections my daughter needs those protections The members of my community, my constituents need that these protections were already in place, they do not fully protect and that is why they give us our

rights

and they give them to us now.

My daughter, who's been with me at a lot of rallies and stuff, that's why you always say when, when. In the

fight

we won and I said because it is true and that is why I am going to continue facing the CRA fight with Representative Bush and others in this multi-generational, multi-racial Coalition, because I am not going to be a liar. to my son when we fight we win and I believe we will