More Than A Magazine, A Movement
In April, the nation’s highest Court will hear a pair of cases that will determine whether the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) preempts state laws that impede emergency abortions needed to protect the health of pregnant people even if they are not on the brink of death.
Both of these cases have ties to the main anti-abortion zealots that helped overturn Roe: Leonard Leo and Alliance Defending Freedom.
We were extremely disappointed by the decision of Mississippi and 14 other states last week to opt-out of a new summer EBT program that would have provided each eligible family with $40 per month per child during the summer to help cover the additional costs of food. For a mother working full-time at minimum wage (approximately $1,160 each month), that $40 could make a huge difference.
Once again, we are reminded that poverty, and all its consequences, are the result of policy choices. But when policy choices put an undue burden on our families, we know that it is our time to step into the gap.
The big news out this week: The expanded child tax credit could be reinstated for three years as part of a bipartisan tax package. This would be a huge deal for families across the country who have been struggling with dwindling supports from the government as pandemic-era boosts expire.
While this latest deal lacks heft—in that it maxes out at a little more than half of the 2021 expanded CTC that was our nation’s greatest tool ever in fighting poverty—it is still significant for putting us back on the path toward radical transformation.
Eighty-five percent of women globally have witnessed online harassment and nearly 40 percent have experienced it directly.
Online abuse is made to feel targeted, personal, individual and organic—when in fact it’s often systemic, strategic and coordinated. Online abuse is one part of a broader spectrum of attacks—digital, physical, legal and psychological—intended to push women and nonbinary individuals offline, out of public discourse and out of their fields of expertise. Regardless of where they live and what they do, the goal is universal: to stop them from doing their jobs and shut them up.
(This article originally appears in the Winter 2024 issue of Ms. Join the Ms. community today and you’ll get issues delivered straight to your mailbox!)
The largest investment in childcare in American history expired this September. As Congress continues to negotiate a budget deal, the need for $16 billion in emergency childcare funding—requested by President Biden and congressional Democrats—remains top of mind for parents, early educators, childcare owners and directors, and employers across the nation.
The Century Foundation’s new report shines a spotlight on the 11 states and Washington, D.C., that have taken action to directly address the childcare cliff with state funds.
Beginning in 2020, many state legislatures began to pass laws that declared that college athletes had the right to sell or license their names, images and likenesses (NILs), and that their eligibility for athletics could not be taken away due to their exercise of those rights.
The monetization of athlete NILs through legitimately independent third parties is not problematic—but once there is university cooperation and involvement, Title IX requires equal treatment of women. There is ample evidence of close and growing university involvement with the collectives, and various estimates put the share of NIL money going to male athletes ranges to be between 80 and 95 percent.
Leaders in Congress agreed on a topline figure to fund the government for the next fiscal year. But it is certainly no cause for celebration. The long-overdue agreement will continue most of last year’s levels, while providing enormous boosts for the Pentagon. With rising costs, last year’s funding levels are not enough for federal safety net programs to meet the needs of struggling Americans. Simply put, more people need more help and they will not get it. This is particularly true among single mothers—40 percent of whom needlessly struggle with food insecurity.
It’s all part of Republicans’ plan to both restrict abortion access and cut nutrition assistance from low-income mothers, infants and young children—creating a new wave of the feminization of poverty.
Back for its third year, Front and Center is a groundbreaking Ms. series that offers first-person accounts of Black mothers living in Jackson, Miss., receiving a guaranteed income. First launched in 2018, the Magnolia Mother’s Trust is about to enter its fifth cohort, bringing the number of moms served to more than 400 and making it the longest-running guaranteed income program in the country. Across the country, guaranteed income pilots like MMT are finding that recipients are overwhelmingly using their payments for basic needs like groceries, housing and transportation.
“There are a lot of single mothers around here who want to work and just don’t have the support or family or guidance in front of them. That lack keeps them in the same position. For some people, all they have is themselves. … To know that I have a back up and can worry less about having enough gas or having to call on my mom. Now that I have this income coming in, I can save a little bit more. I can try to preserve a little bit more. There is light at the end of the tunnel.”
A Texas Supreme Court ruling that forced Kate Cox to leave the state to terminate a nonviable pregnancy attracted the ire of even some Republicans, including Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. And this week, 51 businesses signed onto an amicus brief in support of the 22 women suing Texas over its abortion bans, expressing difficulty in attracting employees and doing business in the state.
Abortion and women’s rights will be determining factors in the 2024 elections. Candidates who don’t take that into account will face severe headwinds—because unfortunately, stories like Cox’s are just going to keep happening. And voters aren’t turning a blind eye.
Weekend Reading for Women’s Representation is a compilation of stories about women’s representation.
This week: how the 14 countries of the Oceania region are doing on women’s representation; Nikki Haley is getting way less attention than her male counterparts; the need for a feminist perspective in discussions around climate change; is Alaska the secret to saving U.S. democracy?; Nicole Rogers is the winner of the Albuquerque City Council District 6 runoff election; and more.
