Politics

Rest in Power: Marjane Satrapi, Whose Masterpiece ‘Persepolis’ Transformed the World’s Understanding of Iran

PUBLISHED 6/8/2026 by

Marjane Satrapi, best known for her memoir and film Persepolis, has died, aged 56. The death of this much loved Iranian French artist, graphic novelist, filmmaker and activist has been met with widespread celebration of her life—and its dedication to resistance, freedom and humanity. French president Emmanuel Macron paid tribute to “a great artist who transformed an Iranian childhood into a universal fable.”

Satrapi illustrated the dislocations of revolution, migration, adolescence and return in such a way that her memoir travelled far beyond her home country.

Through its deceptively simple black-and-white illustrations, Persepolis became globally influential because it offered an intimate account of revolutionary Iran and exile that challenged dominant stereotypes.

For many readers, Satrapi is still the woman who explained Iran in the simplest, yet most powerful way.

Remembering the Senate’s Passage of the 19th Amendment; June Primary Wins and Losses for Women; and Why Women Are Leading the Fight Against AI Data Centers

PUBLISHED 6/5/2026 by

Weekend Reading on Women’s Representation is a compilation of stories about women’s representation in politics, on boards, in sports and entertainment, in judicial offices and in the private sector in the U.S. and around the world—with a little gardening and goodwill mixed in for refreshment!

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This week marked the 107th anniversary of the U.S. Senate’s passage of the 19th Amendment, a reminder that democratic progress is rarely swift and never inevitable. Forty-one years after it was first introduced in Congress, the amendment’s passage reflected decades of organizing, advocacy and persistence by women determined to claim a voice in American democracy.

More than a century later, the anniversary offers an opportunity not only to celebrate that achievement, but also to reflect on the unfinished work of building a democracy that truly includes everyone.

That work continues to shape elections today. From consequential June primary contests across the country to debates over voting systems, women’s representation and democratic participation remain central to the political landscape. This week’s Weekend Reading on Women’s Representation roundup highlights key election results, emerging candidates and reform efforts that could influence who runs, who wins and whose voices are heard in the years ahead.

Also featured are new research connecting attacks on women’s and LGBTQ rights to broader threats to democracy, growing opposition to AI data centers led by women organizers, barriers facing women candidates and officeholders, and inspiring examples of women advancing political change around the world.

Together, these stories underscore a simple but enduring truth: Democracy works best when it is designed to include all of us.

What if Women Really Went Back? Viral Thriller ‘Yesteryear’ Deconstructs the Dark Side of Tradwife Culture

PUBLISHED 6/5/2026 by

What if women really went back? That question sits at the center of Caro Claire Burke’s 2026 debut novel and viral summer read Yesteryear.

At a moment when tradwife influencers are building massive audiences by romanticizing domesticity, submission and “traditional” gender roles, Burke asks readers to imagine what life inside those arrangements actually looks like for the women who lived them—and what rights and freedoms were sacrificed along the way.

Yesteryear follows wealthy, polished (at least on the outside) tradwife influencer Natalie Heller Mills, who has built a carefully curated online brand around nostalgic femininity. But as the fantasy unravels, Burke exposes the gap between aestheticized womanhood and women’s lived experience.

Of Course Trump Is Going After E. Jean Carroll

PUBLISHED 6/5/2026 by

Last week, multiple outlets reported that the Justice Department would be opening a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, the 82-year-old iconic journalist who successfully sued Donald Trump—twice.

It has been more than two years since she prevailed in back-to-back civil lawsuits against him, winning a $5 million verdict in May 2023, followed by another $83.3 million in January 2024. The first jury found Trump liable for committing sexual abuse in a department store dressing room in 1996, as well as defamation for saying Carroll lied about it. The second case, brought because he just wouldn’t stop with the defamation, multiplied the damages exponentially.

The timing of the DOJ announcement should come as no surprise, at least from a public relations point of view. Ask E. Jean, the new documentary about Carroll’s life, including the court cases, premiered days prior. After debuting at the Telluride Film Festival last year without much fanfare, the film is now selling out theaters, garnering high-profile coverage and reviews, and likely embarrassing the president even more than his colossal legal defeat.

Meanwhile, among legal analysts, there is widespread agreement that the DOJ has no legitimate basis for investigating Carroll. But that is hardly the point when it comes to this administration, especially the weaponization of the Justice Department now led by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who represented Trump personally in the Carroll case (and supposedly is recused from this investigation).

The Growing Acceptance of a Movement That Wants to Punish Women for Abortion

PUBLISHED 6/4/2026 by

When South Carolina’s abortion abolitionist bill, the Unborn Child Protection Act (S. 1095), was voted out of committee and onto the full Senate floor in late April—“an unprecedented move toward locking up women who have an abortion,” according to Dana Sussman in Slate—it raised a question: How much influence have abortion abolitionists gained within the broader antiabortion movement?

Abortion abolitionists, who seek to criminalize abortion without exceptions and punish women who obtain abortions as murderers, have long been considered the outer fringe of the antiabortion movement. Their roots can be traced to what Colleen Scerpella described in The Prospect as “a new generation of mostly white, male, conservative Baptists, Presbyterians and Christian Reconstructionists”—or what she calls “extreme Christian patriarchy.”

As I wrote in Ms. a little more than a year ago, the dramatic increase in abortion abolitionist bills filed by state lawmakers after Roe v. Wade fell, signaled the growing influence of this movement.

That extremism has not gone unnoticed: In 2024, the Southern Poverty Law Center identified four abolitionist organizations as “male supremacist hate groups.” Recent research has likewise found that the strongest supporters of arresting women who have abortions are Americans who endorse Christian nationalism, believe “true Americans are white,” and look to the state to enforce a particular ethnocultural social order.

The South Carolina bill, which makes the pregnant woman herself subject to misdemeanor liability, prompted me to revisit the question of whether abortion abolitionists have made more inroads into the mainstream antiabortion movement.

The evidence suggests they have.

War on Women Report: Abortion Access, Academic Freedom and Trans Rights Under Fire

PUBLISHED 5/31/2026 by

MAGA Republicans are back in the White House, and Project 2025 is their guide—the right-wing plan to turn back the clock on women’s rights, remove abortion access, and force women into roles as wives and mothers in the “ideal, natural family structure.” We know an empowered female electorate is essential to democracy. That’s why day after day, we stay vigilant in our goals to dismantle patriarchy at every turn. We are watching, and we refuse to go back. This is the War on Women Report.

Since our last report:

—President Trump lost his latest appeal effort against paying New York writer E. Jean Carroll an $83.3 million defamation judgment.
—The government is using family separation as an antiabortion tactic via Child Protective Services.
—The House passed HR 2616, the so-called Stopping Indoctrination and Protecting Kids Act, with support from eight Democrats; if enacted, the bill would bar federally funded public elementary and middle schools from acknowledging transgender students and require educators to notify parents if a student identifies as transgender at school.
—A reminder: People can order abortion pills from all 50 states, no matter what the courts decide.

… and more.

Buckle Up, the Primaries Are Coming: From New Mexico to California, Women’s Representation Is on the Ballot

PUBLISHED 5/29/2026 by

Weekend Reading on Women’s Representation is a compilation of stories about women’s representation in politics, on boards, in sports and entertainment, in judicial offices and in the private sector in the U.S. and around the world—with a little gardening and goodwill mixed in for refreshment!

This week:

—June primary contests will take place in 18 states.
—Concerning trends are taking place for women’s representation in New Jersey.
—The American Women’s History Museum on the National Mall is at risk.
—All 15 men in Donald Trump’s original Cabinet remain, but four of its seven original women are now left.

… and more.

Dispatches From Ukraine’s Frontlines, Where Feminist Organizing Has Become an Act of Survival

PUBLISHED 5/28/2026 by

A lecture and discussion were about to begin in a local public library. It could have been a scene in New York, London or Melbourne. Yet this event was in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, just 25 kilometers from invading Russian forces, where most of the attendees had fled from Russian occupied cities and villages.

The meeting was one of many organized by Natalia Lobach and the Ukrainian LGBTQ+ human rights group, Insight. Lobach said these events aim to create “safe community spaces for people from different age and social groups,” but they are especially “a good way for vulnerable groups to socialize.”

“Putin’s military is trying to destroy us not only physically, but psychologically as well—to take away our identities,” she said. “We are surviving physically, but we are also preserving our identities and our pride. … Isn’t that a kind of miracle, what we continue to do despite the pressure of such a brutal enemy?”