NWLC Responds to President Biden’s Joint Address to Congress & the First 100 Days of the Biden-Harris Administration
(Washington, D.C.) The following is a statement from Fatima Goss Graves, president and CEO of the National Women’s Law Center:
“The Biden-Harris administration is tasked with historic crises generations in the making, confronting as they must a pandemic that continues to exacerbate racial and gender inequities and a mandate to heal the damage to our institutions and civil rights from the previous administration. On many levels, they’ve met and exceeded that demand. They’ve confronted widespread poverty and hardship through the American Rescue Plan, strengthening food and rental assistance, and expanding tax credits that will be life-changing for boosting family economic security. They’ve enacted historic relief for the child care sector and are laying the groundwork for broader investments in care infrastructure They’ve reaffirmed the rights of workers and reinstated protections against racial, gender, and anti-LGBTQ bias. And they’ve nominated a historically diverse administration, including Black, brown, Indigenous, and transgender women.
“Even with this ambitious agenda, however, much is still left on the table. For example, it’s incumbent upon this administration to do everything in its power to reverse the damage of the last four years and implement policies that protect and expand access to abortion and birth control, remove cost as a barrier to health care and ensure access to health coverage for all. Likewise, the rights of students and students of color in particular demand a robust and active plan from our federal government, including a strong defense of the rights of sexual violence survivors. Those pieces were missing from this landmark speech and we believe it is critical that the President use the powerful tool of the bully pulpit in addition to driving important policy change on these important areas.”
Earlier this year, the National Women’s Law Center launched 100 Wins, 100 Days: Decisive Actions to Advance Gender Justice to track the progress of the Biden-Harris administration. We celebrated many victories because of the work of the thousands of supporters who pushed the administration and their lawmakers in Congress to take decisive action, dream big, and invest in communities who have been pushed aside for too long.