Author: Roxanne Szal

Roxanne Szal (or Roxy) is the managing digital editor at Ms. and a producer on the Ms. podcast On the Issues With Michele Goodwin. She is also a mentor editor for The OpEd Project. Before becoming a journalist, she was a Texas public school English teacher. She is based in Austin, Texas. Connect with her on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Feminists and Democracy Advocates Sound the Alarm on Todd Blanche: ‘He Is Trump’s Lawyer, Not America’s’

and

In a party line vote of 12-10, the Senate Judiciary Committee advanced Todd Blanche’s nomination for attorney general on Wednesday; a full Senate vote is expected in the coming days. The vote prompted a wave of criticism from feminist leaders, democracy advocates and Democratic lawmakers, who warned President Donald Trump’s former personal defense attorney has repeatedly demonstrated his loyalty to the president over the Constitution, and could further erode the Justice Department’s independence at a pivotal moment for U.S. democracy, while also threatening access to reproductive healthcare.

“He is not America’s lawyer,” Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) said on the Senate floor. “He is about to become Trump’s sword against his adversaries and shield against any scrutiny.”

“Our Republican colleagues see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) said during debate.

As the Senate prepared to vote on Todd Blanche’s confirmation as attorney general, another major development emerged, adding fresh urgency to warnings from reproductive rights advocates: A new Politico report reveals Blanche privately pledged antiabortion leaders the DOJ would pursue a crackdown on medication abortion if confirmed with the goal of “the Dobbs decision [becoming] permanent in every single state.”

Can You Believe They Put This in Writing? The Wildest Quotes From Heritage’s ‘Project 2026’

, , , and

The Heritage Foundation has once again taken it upon itself to craft a plan for how to supposedly save America. The report—”Saving America by Saving the Family: A Foundation for the Next 250 Years”—focuses on marriage, family and the American Dream, and has become widely known as “Project 2026,” a follow-up to Heritage’s infamous Project 2025 blueprint.

Project 2025 clocked in at 900 pages; the sequel is around 150. We read the whole thing and pulled out the passages that gave us chills, made us laugh out loud, compelled us to suddenly need to take a long walk and hug our dogs, or inspired another donation to our local abortion fund.

This isn’t intended to be a fact-check or a line-by-line rebuttal. It’s intended to show you how some of the country’s most influential conservative thinkers are talking about feminism, contraception, abortion, LGBTQ+ people, higher education, marriage, motherhood and the role government should play in all of it—because you’re probably too busy to read hundreds of pages of anti-feminist slop.

And because, as former Vice President Kamala Harris famously said about Project 2025: “Can you believe they put that thing in writing?” They did—twice now!

This is the roadmap they’re offering. These documents tell us how their authors understand the country, the family and women’s place in both. We should know what it says.

Trump Escalates Pressure to Pass the SAVE America Act Before Senate Recess

President Donald Trump is pressuring Senate Republicans to pass the SAVE America Act before lawmakers leave for their August recess, even calling on them to abolish the filibuster if necessary.

Despite the pressure, Republicans still don’t have the votes to move the legislation forward. But after four failed attempts in two years, they’re once again looking for a legislative vehicle to make it law.

About 80 percent of women who marry change their last names, meaning millions could be forced to produce additional paperwork to prove both their identity and citizenship before registering to vote or updating their registration. Students, military families, naturalized citizens, voters with disabilities, Americans who have recently moved, and trans Americans who have changed their names would also face new barriers to casting a ballot. And all of it is aimed at solving a problem that election officials and researchers have repeatedly found is extraordinarily rare.

Once voters understand those consequences, support for the legislation drops sharply. Polling shows that while “proof of citizenship” sounds popular in theory, support falls into net opposition once Americans learn that many eligible voters would need to track down documents like passports or birth certificates just to register or update their voter registration.

Nevertheless, Republicans continue searching for a path to enact the SAVE America Act. Will millions of eligible Americans, especially women, soon face new obstacles to exercising their fundamental right to vote?

This story is updated regularly as Congress and the Trump administration continue efforts to enact the SAVE America Act.

Civil Rights Groups Launch Southern Voting Rights Mobilization Following Supreme Court’s Callais Decision

Civil and voting rights organizations across the South are launching a wave of rallies, trainings and grassroots mobilizations in response to the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Louisiana v. Callais, which decimated one of the last meaningful protections against racially discriminatory voting maps.

Over the next two months in Missouri, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, as well as online, organizers will mobilize against the top-down national assault on Black political representation and multiracial democracy itself.

The actions come amid growing fears that the Court’s ruling will make it dramatically harder for Black voters and other voters of color to challenge discriminatory district maps in federal court.

Civil rights groups are calling for mass organizing and voter engagement, laying a groundwork for rebuilding the country through “sustained effort over time.” They also urge states to adopt their own Voting Rights Acts to help fill the vacuum left by the weakening of federal protections.

Upcoming actions include rallies at the Missouri Supreme Court, a National Day of Action in Alabama featuring events at the Edmund Pettus Bridge and the Alabama State Capitol, and the nationwide “John Lewis Good Trouble Lives On” mobilization planned for July.

Justice Kagan Sounds the Alarm as Supreme Court Dismantles Voting Rights Protections: ‘Elected Politicians Picking Their Voters’

and

In a 6-3 decision in Callais v. Louisiana on Wednesday, the Supreme Court struck down Louisiana’s current congressional map—drawn after the 2020 census to include a second majority-Black district—and, in doing so, weakened Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, the last remaining nationwide tool for challenging racially discriminatory voting laws.

‘A Warning Shot’: DOJ Indictment of Southern Poverty Law Center Sparks Outcry Across Civil and Women’s Rights Movement

and

The U.S. Department of Justice’s criminal case against the Southern Poverty Law Center marks a stunning escalation in the federal government’s attacks and aggression toward civil rights organizations. A grand jury has indicted the SPLC on charges of wire fraud, bank fraud and money laundering—allegations the organization has called false and politically motivated.

The charges are rooted in bad-faith characterizations of payments SPLC made to informants in extremist groups like the Ku Klux Klan. Trump’s DOJ is attempting to argue these payments counted as financial support. In reality, the SPLC’s work helped dismantle some of the country’s most prominent white supremacist groups.

For feminist and civil rights groups, the indictment is the clearest sign yet of an escalating campaign to intimidate the nonprofit sector, criminalize civil rights advocacy and silence dissent. In their view, the administration is not only attacking outcomes or messages, but working to turn the machinery of government itself against advocacy groups: criminal law, regulatory scrutiny and national security frameworks.

‘First They Came for My College’: The Takeover of a Florida College and the Students Who Refused to Disappear

When I told coworkers and friends I was going to see a documentary about the right-wing takeover of a small public Florida college, the reaction was immediate and unanimous: Why would you do that to yourself? Too depressing. I’d be too angry.

They weren’t wrong. Premiering at SXSW last month and directed by Patrick Bresnan, First They Came for My College is, at times, almost unbearable to watch—a slow, procedural dismantling of a public institution, carried out in meeting rooms and press conferences and budget lines.

But what stayed with me wasn’t only the anger—it was the stubborn, surprising insistence on community, joy and showing up anyway.

14 Powerful Lines From Justice Jackson’s Dissent on Conversion Therapy: ‘Like It or Not, Treatment Standards Exist in America’

The Supreme Court on Tuesday struck down Colorado’s ban on conversion therapy for LGBTQ youth, ruling the law likely violates the First Amendment—a decision advocates warn will put young people at risk.

In a rare and forceful move, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson delivered her dissent from the bench.

We’ve pulled the most powerful, incisive—and yes, spiciest—lines from her 35-page dissent. Read, share your favorite line, and help lift up a dissent that refuses to mince words about what’s at stake.

Furious, Fearless and Defiant: Our Favorite Protest Signs From No Kings 3.0

and

On Saturday, March 28, 2026, millions showed up for the latest wave of No Kings protests, drawing an estimated 8 million people across more than 3,300 events worldwide.

The flagship event was held in Minneapolis-St. Paul, the site of a controversial immigration enforcement surge resulting in the deaths of two residents, Renée Nicole Macklin Good and Alex Pretti, at the hands of federal agents.