Eighteen Civil Rights, Reproductive Rights Organizations Request Meeting with White House: "We Need to Boldly Protect Abortion Access and Voting Rights"

WASHINGTON, DC – Today, in an unprecedented move, leaders of eight legacy civil rights organizations have joined together with leaders of national reproductive rights, health, and justice organizations to request a meeting with President Biden, following his Executive Order, to discuss implementation, and the overwhelming impact of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and the need to mitigate harm in the fallout.

This letter explicitly highlights the disproportionate impact this decision will have on Black women, other women of color, and vulnerable women, and the undeniable connection between abortion access and other social justice issues, including voter disenfranchisement, policing abuse, criminal injustice, poverty, economic inequity, housing inequity, LGBTQ+ rights, the immigration crisis, food insecurity, medical bias, and environmental injustice.

In their letter to President Biden, the signers wrote:

“Our shared mission includes the goal of protecting the constitutional rights of all, and so we stand united in this moment as we face a national public health crisis and attack on our basic freedoms…

“The attack on abortion rights cannot be separated from the broader attack on democracy that is waging across our nation. Partisans are attacking voting rights and voter access in nearly every state in our union, fueled by fear of a majority-minority electorate, aided by a Supreme Court that has undermined the federal Voting Rights Act, and abetted by a United States Senate that places fidelity to an arcane procedural rule over majority rule…we know that this attack on freedom and rollback of long-held rights will not end with abortion rights.”

The signers of this letter include: Alexis McGill Johnson, President, Planned Parenthood Federation of America; Marc H. Morial, President and CEO, National Urban League; Rev. Al Sharpton, President and Founder, National Action Network; Derrick Johnson, President and CEO, NAACP; Nancy Northup, President and CEO,

Center for Reproductive Rights; Maya Wiley, President and CEO, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights; Fatima Goss Graves, President, National Women’s Law Center; Melanie L. Campbell, President and CEO, Black Women’s Roundtable; Damon Hewitt, President, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights; Imani Rupert-Gordon, Executive Director, National Center for Lesbian Rights; Janai S. Nelson, President and Director-Counsel, Legal Defense Fund; Jocelyn Frye, President, National Partnership for Women & Families; Kimberly Inez McGuire, Executive Director, URGE: Unite for Reproductive & Gender Equity; Monica Simpson, Executive Director, SisterSong; Rev. Leah Daughtry, Co-Convener, Power Rising; Marcela Howell, President and CEO, In Our Own Voice; Mini Timmaraju, President, NARAL-Pro Choice America; Dr. Thelma T. Daley, National President/Chair, National Council for Negro Women, Inc.; 

A copy of this letter is available here.