August 26, 2025
Women’s Rights Day

Time for radical solidarity to stop the rightwing rollback!

August 26 is Women’s Rights Day, the anniversary of the certification of the 19th Amendment that said the right to vote should not be limited by sex. That milestone, giving females access to the ballot box, was not a gift from the powerful but was won through decades of organizing and sacrifice.

As a leader in the suffrage movement, Sojourner Truth once asked, “Ain’t I a woman?” to expose how stereotypes of femininity made Black women invisible and hurt all women. Unfortunately, entrenched racism kept women of color disenfranchised for decades after the 19th Amendment became law in 1920. Puerto Rican women were barred from casting a vote until 1935, and many Asian women were denied their rights until the 1950s. Jim Crow laws kept Black women in the South from the ballot until the 1960s. Indigenous women, too, were largely excluded until that same era. Yet women of color carried on the struggle for full rights and humanity — proving again and again that real progress only comes when we organize together.

Today, the struggle continues. Trump’s “Big Ugly Bill” threatens devastating consequences for women, children, communities of color, the disabled, and working people. But women are fighting back.

When ICE invades immigrant neighborhoods in Los Angeles with assault rifles, teargas, and troops, hundreds flood the streets — mothers, daughters, workers, neighbors standing shoulder to shoulder. Fighting back in solidarity.

When D.C. residents resist checkpoints and occupation, rallying at Dupont Circle and marching on the White House to defend their city, women are at the front, refusing to bow. Fighting back.

Across the country, protests defend LGBTQI+ siblings and communities. Fighting back in solidarity.

All working people are impacted by these attacks, giving rise to calls for a general strike with the knowledge that our strength lies in collective action. And in every one of these struggles, women are not only present — they are leading, with the message of solidarity.

On this Women’s Rights Day, we celebrate the suffragists’ hard-won victory and vow to protect and extend the voting rights that are acutely threatened for people of color – and once again for women. Our answer in 2025 is clear — women will not only resist repression, we will defeat it, together, in radical solidarity.

In solidarity,
Brooke Sassi
Denver, Colorado