On Tuesday, we shut down Constitution Avenue in Washington DC, demanding that Joe Biden publish the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) and explicitly codify sex equality for women and queer people in the US constitution. The ERA can protect women’s and LGBTQ+ rights under a second Trump administration. That’s why our generation has taken up the 101-year-long struggle for constitutional sex equality.
The ERA consists of 24 simple words: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” If published – legal terminology for “added to the constitution” – the ERA would put an end to legalized sex discrimination. It has met both requirements for publication in the US constitution: the ERA passed both chambers of Congress with more than a two-thirds majority in 1972, and in 2020, Virginia became the 38th and final state needed to ratify the ERA. It is Biden’s constitutional right – and duty – to immediately certify and publish the Equal Rights Amendment.
We came to Washington to protest on 10 December, the 101st anniversary of the ERA’s introduction in Congress. Alongside Representative Cori Bush, we carried the torch for constitutional sex equality.
When we sat down on Constitution Avenue and refused to move, we risked legal repercussions – but those risks pale in comparison to those of Trump and Project 2025. They are nothing when compared to the deadly consequences of existing abortion bans, which have already killed at least five women – Porsha Evette Ngumezi, Josseli Barnica, Nevaeh Crain, Amber Thurman and Candi Miller – in states with near-total abortion bans. State-level ERAs in Utah, Connecticut, Nevada and Pennsylvania have successfully blocked abortion bans and restrictions. The ERA could have protected these women and numerous others whose names and stories haven’t yet been heard. Instead, we now must mourn them.
We put our bodies on the line – because our bodies are on the line. As women and queer Americans, we feel the pressure of a looming Trump presidency and know the administration wants to strip basic rights. The ERA will protect abortion access, gender-affirming healthcare, and equal pay by explicitly prohibiting sex-based discrimination in our nation’s most foundational document.
While our friends chanted around us, the Capitol police pulled us upright and dragged us onto the sidewalk, where they ripped away our green bandanas, megaphones and signs plastered with the letters: “BIDEN PUBLISH #ERANOW”. Then, we were arrested by police for protesting for equality under the law. Through aggressive pat-downs, a bumpy trip to the station, and a dark holding cell, we felt the weight of what was on the line: not only our rights, but the fate of democracy. A democracy excluding the millions of Americans who are women and LGBTQ+ isn’t a democracy at all.
We should be studying for finals, hanging with friends, and applying to internships–we shouldn’t have to put our bodies on the line for Biden to act. But how can we live out our youth when our rights are at risk?
When we were released into a rainy parking lot, we ran over to our co-organizers waiting for us in a minivan with exuberant joy – not just that we were safe and free, but because we saw the thousands of young people springing to action to demand Biden put us in the constitution. We were in this fight together – carrying a torch lit more than 100 years ago by women who could only dream of seeing just how close we are to finishing the fight.
With less than 40 days until Trump’s inauguration, we are working around the clock to protect abortion and LGBTQ+ rights. With his Republican trifecta, Trump plans to ban abortion nationwide, gut reproductive healthcare, and criminalize queer and trans identities. The Equal Rights Amendment can protect our lives, bodies and rights from one-party rule. An amendment cannot be rolled back. An amendment will outlive and transcend the whims of partisan politics. The United States is the only industrialized nation that does not guarantee sex equality in the constitution despite being the world’s largest economic force. This omission is glaring, unacceptable and undemocratic.
We call on Biden to publish the Equal Rights Amendment. Tuesday marked the 101st anniversary of the Equal Rights Amendment’s introduction to Congress; it passed almost unanimously. And with a single stroke of a pen, it could become law – giving America’s most marginalized a fighting chance against an incoming administration certain to put their rights under attack. President Biden, fight for us.
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Grace Tallmadge is the organizing director of the Feminist Front, a national gender justice youth organization.
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Claudia Nachega is the deputy director of the Young Feminist Party, a youth-led movement for the Equal Rights Amendment.
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Ella Duncan-High is the organizing director of the Young Feminist Party.
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