This Mother’s Day weekend arrives amid extraordinary legal and political upheaval over reproductive freedom, voting rights and the economic survival of mothers.
The Ms. Must-Read
In Iran, Iraq and the U.S., Women Speak Out Against State Repression
Internationally acclaimed Iranian human rights attorney and women’s rights advocate Nasrin Sotoudeh has been arrested by the Iranian regime. Her whereabouts are currently unknown. Our hearts are with Sotoudeh and her family, including her husband Reza Khandan, who has been detained in Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison since December 2024 for supporting her work for women’s equality.
Meanwhile in Baghdad, an American freelance journalist has been kidnapped. Shelly Kittleson, who had built her freelance career reporting from the Middle East for years, is known among colleagues for her determined, on-the-ground reporting and willingness to go where others would not. On Tuesday, she was taken by two unknown men, after learning of threats to her safety from militias.
Time and time again, it is women who speak out in the face of state repression—whether they are doing so as journalists speaking truth to power, lawyers fighting for the rights of the oppressed, or everyday women taking to the streets in defiance of regimes that seek to strip them of their autonomy and human rights.
Women Make Our Movements Powerful. They Shouldn’t Have to Suffer in Silence.
A New York Times investigation released this week broke news of shocking sexual abuse allegations against labor leader César Chávez—from two women who were young teenagers at the time, and from Dolores Huerta, our long-time Ms. advisor, Feminist Majority Foundation (publisher of Ms.) board member, friend, and feminist and labor icon who co-founded the United Farm Workers with Chávez.
In fighting the culture that makes these actions not only possible, but permissible—and that encourages women like Huerta to remain silent for over 60 years—we must consider the role of men.
Men, argues Ms. contributor Jackson Katz, are essential to shifting the narrative. In describing the case of Gisèle Pelicot, a woman who had been secretly drugged by her husband and set up to be raped by dozens of men over a 10-year period, Katz mentions the evocative nickname the case acquired in French media reports: Monsieur Tout-le-monde. Mr. Everyman.
If the 50 men who assaulted Pelicot were just “ordinary men” (“many were married and had kids. They were blue- and white-collar workers: a restaurant manager, nurse, computer technician, prison guard, firefighter, journalist, soldier,” Katz writes), then consequently, every man has a role to play in dismantling systemic violence against women.
The SAVE Act Isn’t About Election Security. It’s About Blocking Women, Young and Low-Income Voters
The SAVE Act—the Republicans’ attempt to strip voting rights from millions of Americans under the guise of “safeguarding” elections that are already quite safe—is now headed for debate in the Senate, and President Donald Trump is pushing hard for the bill. Top Democrats say the GOP’s real aim is to “rig the system” by putting paperwork and ID barriers in front of millions of currently eligible voters, and that the bill is part of a larger, ongoing effort to undermine trust in elections and reshape rules in Trump’s favor.
Under the SAVE Act, people would have to show “proof of citizenship,” in the form of a passport or a birth certificate, in order to be allowed to register to vote.
But 21.3 million people (more than 9 percent of Americans) don’t have these documents readily available, and at least 3.8 million don’t have them at all, according to the Brennan Center for Justice. Just over half of Americans (51 percent) lack a passport, a document that is time-consuming and costly to acquire or replace.
The SAVE Act will also disproportionately impact women who have changed or hyphenated their names—which is over 80 percent of women married to men.
Likewise, elderly voters, young voters and voters without the financial means to acquire these documents will be overwhelmingly impacted.
A Month of Fear: ICE’s Surge in Minneapolis and the Backlash That Won’t Quit
For the people of Minneapolis, it has been another week of startling violence as the Trump administration continues to mobilize ICE officers into the city—shuttering schools and businesses and leaving residents afraid to leave their homes. Still, thousands have taken to the streets to resist.
One such resister’s story came to us through our Ms. community: Skye, a disabled U.S. Marine Corps veteran who has been participating in citizen observer efforts to warn neighbors about ICE presence. “This is my duty,” she told Ms. “I took an oath to defend the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic. … [ICE agents] are terrorizing our citizens.”
If there’s a silver lining, it’s that people aren’t staying silent. Protests have filled streets in Minneapolis and far beyond. As we honor Martin Luther King Jr. Day, we’re reminded that racial justice, gender equality, reproductive rights and an end to state violence are intertwined struggles.
Congress Went on Recess. Americans Got Higher Healthcare Bills.
Congressional discussions on extending the Affordable Care Act (ACA) tax credits, which are set to expire Dec. 31, remain deadlocked as Congress begins its winter recess. Now, millions will see their premiums increase as a result: Payments will more than double on average—some even quadrupling—for enrollees who were eligible for the tax credits.
Without the extension, more and more ACA marketplace enrollees will drop their increasingly costly health insurance plans. This comes at a time when the ACA is more popular than ever—recent polls show that across the political spectrum, three quarters of voters support extending the tax credits.
Could the administration’s latest attack on transgender young people be the administration’s way of deflecting attention from the disaster unfolding in real time for millions of families in need of healthcare?
Women’s Labor Makes the Holidays Possible
Women make the holidays happen, even as policymakers undermine the programs meant to support families—including SNAP and Affordable Care Act subsidies to make healthcare more affordable.
Project 2026 Declares Open War on Women’s Rights
When The Heritage Foundation released its new policy blueprint for 2026 this week—an extension of the now-infamous Project 2025—it did so with the calm confidence of an institution convinced no one will stop it. The document is shorter than last year’s 900-page “Mandate for Leadership,” but no less dangerous. It is, in fact, more candid.
Project 2026 lays out a government redesigned to control women’s bodies, erase LGBTQ+ lives, dismantle civil rights protections and roll back decades of hard-won progress. Wrapped in the language of “family,” “sovereignty” and “restoring America,” it is a direct attempt to impose a narrow, rigid ideology on an entire nation.
Make no mistake: This is a plan for forced motherhood, government-policed gender and the end of women’s equality as we know it.
But Project 2026 is not destiny. It is a warning—and one we must answer with the full force of a movement that has never accepted a future written for us by someone else.
Republicans’ ‘National Backdoor Abortion Ban’
Millions are on the brink of seeing the costs of their health insurance skyrocket if Congress fails to extend the ACA tax credits due to expire Dec. 31.
Now, Republicans are seeking to use the debate over the tax credits to pursue what Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) has warned is a “national backdoor abortion ban” by expanding the scope of the Hyde Amendment.
Since 1977, the Hyde Amendment has prohibited the use of federal funds for abortion except under limited exceptions for cases where the life of the woman is in danger, or in cases of rape or incest. But opponents of abortion in Congress want to prohibit ACA marketplace plans from covering abortion even in states where abortion remains legal. This means that even if a state requires insurance plans to cover abortion, and uses its own funds to do so, federal law would block it. Private insurance plans sold through the ACA marketplace would also be impacted.
A vote on the issue is expected in the Senate on Thursday, Dec. 11.
Republicans Are Holding Women’s Health Hostage
As the government shutdown drags into another week, women and their families have the most to lose. The Republican budget that triggered this fight guts Medicaid and rolls back ACA tax credits that make health insurance affordable for millions—what experts are calling a “quiet repeal” of the Affordable Care Act. Nearly 50 years after Rosie Jiménez died because she was denied Medicaid coverage for abortion, we’re watching the same systems endanger women’s lives all over again.
And yet, there’s reason for hope: The FDA just approved a new generic version of mifepristone, expanding access to medication abortion at a moment when it’s most under attack.