Statement from NOW President Toni Van Pelt:

WASHINGTON, D.C.— I was proud to join my fellow climate activists at Jane Fonda’s last Fire Drill Friday in Washington, D.C., before she heads back to L.A.  We are answering the alarm sounded by Greta Thunberg and other young people who are reminding us every day that “there is no planet B.” 

I am tremendously proud to be one of those arrested for civil disobedience and stand in solidarity with the women and girls who are finding climate solutions such as blocking deforestation and improving agricultural practices to organizing grassroots protests and running for office.

Climate change is a woman’s issue—impacting vulnerable populations that are already at risk.  Extreme weather events make it even harder for women to do their work, care for their loved ones and overcome obstacles to their safety and security.  

NOW joins Fire Drill Friday’s demands for environmental justice, respect of Indigenous land and sovereignty, protection and restoration of biodiversity and implementation of sustainable agriculture.  These are all issues of urgency and importance to women. 

As the saying goes, “women hold up half the sky.”  Today, the sky is literally on fire in places such as Australia. NOW and other activist, feminist, environmentalist women will hold up our part of our compact with the environment and promote bold action to prevent further catastrophe and promote climate solutions. 

Contact

Kimberly Hayes, Press Secretary, press@now.org, 202-570-4745

Statement by NOW President Toni Van Pelt:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — It’s no surprise that President Donald Trump and Attorney General William Barr would unleash the full force of the Department of Justice to thwart ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA).  In a newly released legal opinion, the Office of Legal Counsel asserts that the 1979 deadline for passage “has expired and is no longer pending before the States.” 

We know that Trump opposes women’s rights and gender equality, and that with Bill Barr, Stephen Moore and his other cronies enabling his worst tendencies, our nation of laws is being subverted to suit his misogynistic whims. 

Legislation is pending in Congress to remove the 1979 deadline which appears in the preface to the Equal Rights Amendment in the 1972 resolution. NOW and our grassroots activists are working hard to assure that this happens. 

This announcement is clearly designed to cast a shadow over the Virginia General Assembly’s effort to make Virginia the 38th—and final–state needed to approve the ERA. But Virginia legislators are passionately committed to passage of the amendment and will not be deterred. No amount of Trump-logic legal wishful thinking can deny the ERA’s progress or stop women from demanding full Constitutional equality. 

Contact

Kimberly Hayes, Press Secretary, press@now.org, 202-570-4745

Statement from NOW President Toni Van Pelt:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A lawsuit by Alabama’s Attorney General to block the renewed push to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment is, as the ERA Coalition stated, “a shameful effort to keep women from gaining Constitutional equality.”

This crowd of extremist state attorneys general continues to march in lockstep with Bill Barr’s increasingly unconstitutional Justice Department. There is nothing they won’t do to undermine equality and perpetuate the patriarchy. In his suit, Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall says that “the ERA would not promote true equality, but rather a far-left agenda.”

The false assertion that the ERA is unnecessary is the same kind of hateful trope used to undermine civil rights laws during the 1960’s.  NOW opposes this clear and shameful action to block equal rights and justice for women, and with our ERA Coalition partners we will stay on the front lines defending the ERA until it is ratified into law.

Contact

Press Team, press@now.org, 202.695.8221