Social Security

Trump’s Speech Was Full of Broken Promises, Lies, and Warnings of More Damage for Women and Families

PUBLISHED 3/5/2025 by

As President Donald Trump took the stage on Tuesday night for his joint address to Congress, the stock market is down, inflation is up, consumer confidence levels are at their lowest levels since August 2021, and a large majority of Americans believe the economy and their personal cost of living are on the wrong track.

Trump’s address to Congress was filled with falsehoods, broken promises and attacks on women and families, signaling more harmful policies ahead. He pushed tax cuts for the wealthy at the expense of essential programs like Medicaid and Social Security, ramped up anti-immigration rhetoric, and prioritized culture war issues over real economic solutions.

Keeping Score: Executive Orders Attack Trans Community; Americans Need Paid Leave and Childcare Policies; Unvaccinated Measles Cases Soar

PUBLISHED 3/4/2025 by

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week: Trump’s executive orders continue to threaten trans people’s safety, jobs and rights; policies like paid family leave and universal preschool are incredibly popular; measles spreads among unvaccinated populations; Congress signals their plan to cut SNAP and Medicaid; women’s college basketball teams will be paid for March Madness games; almost a quarter of Gen Z adults are part of the LGBTQ community; and more.

Keeping Score: Court Blocks Student Loan Relief Plan; Former N.Y. Cop Sentenced 10 Weekends in Jail After Child Rape; Trump’s ‘Tampon Tim’ Jab Backfires

PUBLISHED 8/29/2024 by

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week: Kamala Harris reaffirmed her candidacy for president at the DNC; Republican-appointed judges strike down Biden’s student loan relief plan; a new law bans women from speaking in public in Afghanistan; working moms earn just 71 cents per dollar earned by dads; understanding the orgasm gap; gold-medalist boxer Imane Khelif fights back against racist and sexist abuse; new reproductive rights bills signed into law in Illinois; and more.

Anti-Abortion Extremists Are Diverting Tax Dollars to Crisis Pregnancy Centers

PUBLISHED 4/17/2024 by and

Anti-abortion politicians are siphoning public dollars meant for low-income mothers and their children to fund anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs) that coerce poor women and teens seeking an abortion to give birth, further condemning them to long-term economic hardship. Being denied a wanted abortion is a proven predictor of maternal and child poverty.

As the Biden administration advances a proposal to prohibit CPCs from future access to these federal funds, the anti-abortion movement is pushing back in force, claiming CPCs save taxpayer dollars and provide vital healthcare and safety net services to poor families. A first-time analysis of the CPC industry’s own reporting wholly contradicts these claims.

Federal Budget Battles Put Women and Families at the Forefront

PUBLISHED 4/13/2024 by

Too often, investments in housing, affordable and quality healthcare, child and elder care, paid family and medical leave—all of which allow women and families to thrive—are the first to get cut when lawmakers talk of “cutting wasteful government spending” or “balancing the budget.”

President Joe Biden’s most recent budget proposal bucks that historical trend in a big way.

Front and Center: ‘We’re Working and Making Money, It’s Still Not Enough. Our Kids Are Going Without.’

PUBLISHED 10/18/2023 by

Front and Center is a groundbreaking series created in partnership with the Magnolia Mother’s Trust, which aims to put front and center the voices of Black women who are affected most by the often-abstract policies debated at the national level.

“The last time I applied for SNAP, they told me I made too much to qualify. So, I’m not making enough at work to be able to care for my people, and at the same time I can’t get food stamps? It doesn’t make any sense. … And what we do bring home goes toward rent. And just like the Rental Assistance Program, as soon as I’m making a little bit more money—boom, I’m paying the full amount of rent. So how can we ever save? How can we ever do better for ourselves?”

Affordable Housing as a Human Right: Activist Diane Yentel on the U.S. Housing Crisis, Racial Justice and Democracy

PUBLISHED 9/21/2022 by

Right now, low-income renters are facing rising inflation, skyrocketing rents, limited tenant protections and a shortage of affordable units. Predictably, this is leading to an increasing number of evictions and a spike in homelessness.

Diane Yentel, president and CEO of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, sees housing and racial justice as inextricably linked. “We must ensure that low-income people can participate in democracy by removing the barriers to voting that make it difficult to cast a ballot.”