“In charging four current and former Louisville police officers with violating Breonna Taylor’s civil rights, the U.S. Department of Justice yesterday offered hope for long-delayed accountability for her tragic, disgraceful murder by police. Taylor was the victim of an illegal, no-knock drug raid on her home. She was shot eight times while she lay in her bed. The person the police claimed to be looking for had already been arrested and did not live there. It is worth saying that Breonna was not a suspect and had not committed a crime. However, even if she had, the police are not, and should never be judge, jury, and executioner. 

“We continue to stand with Breonna Taylor’s mom and family, and all those who love her, and will not stop fighting for a world where no mother loses her children at the hands of people charged with ensuring public safety. We deserve real systems of community safety rooted in care, health, and economic opportunity, not criminalization, incarceration, and militarized police who act with impunity.” 

-Statement of Monifa Bandele, Chief Strategy Officer, MomsRising

“Today, the U.S. Department of Justice said her name, moving to hold four people who are or were police accountable for the March 2020 murder of Breonna Taylor, a young first responder murdered by police while she slept in her bed. Attorney General Merrick Garland was right when he said that ‘Breonna Taylor should still be alive.’ She is not because of police misconduct, which until now has gone without any direct steps toward criminal accountability. We hope these federal charges mean that will finally change.

“Our hearts are with Breonna Taylor’s family in the painful quest for justice, which must be realized. Until we end mass criminalization and mass incarceration and hold police officers who commit crimes accountable, none of us and none of our communities will be safe.”

-Statement of Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, Executive Director and CEO, MomsRising

The MomsRising Education Fund announced today that it is receiving generous multi-year funding from Pivotal as a part of Melinda French Gates’ commitment to supercharge the work to advance women’s power and protect the rights of women and moms across the United States. MomsRising will use the generous grant, which will continue through 2026, to fight for progress on the issues that matter most to moms and families – including paid family and medical leave, quality affordable child care, fair pay, and reproductive and maternal health care – at the local, state, and national levels.

With more than a million members, including moms in every state, MomsRising is a grassroots organization working to achieve economic security for all moms, women, and families in the United States. The organization mobilizes and amplifies the voices of moms to advocate for the reforms that will make it possible for families, businesses, and our economy to thrive.

“Everyone at MomsRising is deeply honored and enormously grateful to Melinda French Gates for this generous grant,” said MomsRising Executive Director and CEO Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner. “It comes at a time when we are working tirelessly not just to make progress, but also to protect and restore gains we made in the past. This is a crucial, perilous moment, as we face the very real possibility that our daughters will have fewer rights and protections than their moms and even their grandmothers. Our future is truly at stake. This funding support is incredibly well-timed as we look to overcome challenges and intensify our work.”

“My commitment is to ensure we are doing more to unlock women and girls’ power and we are accelerating progress now,” said Melinda French Gates, founder of Pivotal. “The organizations we’re working with have a proven track record in fighting to protect women’s rights and advancing their power and influence in the United States. I look forward to all they will continue to accomplish.”

Despite the pressing need for attention and investment, only about 2% of charitable giving in the United States goes to organizations focused on women and girls.

“America’s moms are alarmed and horrified that ICE has been endangering children, separating families, and harming tax-paying members of our communities without any due process. When people in Los Angeles and across this nation stand up for their immigrant friends and neighbors to receive due process and be treated fairly, it’s democracy – not a rebellion that justifies military intervention in any way. 

“We will not stop protesting Trump’s atrocities in peaceful ways, urging leaders to protect our communities, and exercising our first amendment rights. We will not stand silently by as President Trump militarizes our streets and endangers our children. And we will very definitely not be distracted from our fierce opposition to what Republicans in Congress are doing right now to take health care and food away from millions of moms and families in order to pay for separating families, abusing their human rights, and terrifying hardworking immigrants who are essential to our care workforce, our economy, and our future. Our country needs a safe and orderly immigration process that balances compassion and security, not cuts to health care and not cruelty.

“President Trump is doing everything he can to inflame tensions in Los Angeles and to provoke even more anger and division, just as he has spent years stoking hate and baseless fear about immigrants. No cruelty is ever okay and especially not on the taxpayer dime. But what's even worse is that these harms are happening at the expense of health care, veterans’ benefits, child care, and schools. Taking billions from children and families to pay for harm and cruelty doesn't put America first, it puts us last. Moms will continue working for the day when every child and family is treated with dignity, compassion and respect.”

“The jobs report released this week was further evidence that women of color are bearing the brunt of the economic devastation the pandemic has brought. Some 82,000 Black women and 31,000 Latinas lost their jobs in December and there are indications that white women made gains. Many more women and moms were forced to leave the labor force in the face of virtual schooling, dwindling child care options, and our nation’s lack of paid sick days and paid family leave. Overall, there are nearly 2.1 million fewer women in our country’s workforce today than were in it before the pandemic began, and even more women and women of color working part-time because they cannot find full-time jobs. Our economy will never thrive if women are not fully represented in the workforce.

“Many experts attributed women’s job losses to our concentration in the hospitality, retail and education sectors but the truth is, deeply embedded systemic racism is what forces women into low-wage jobs that offer few, if any benefits and little job security. That must end.

Building back better must include ensuring that moms, women, and in particular women of color have access to jobs that pay a living wage and offer good benefits and reasonable opportunities to advance.

"Unless we do, our economy and our country will never thrive.”

-Statement of Ruth Martin, Vice President and Chief Workplace Justice Officer, MomsRising

“From last week’s seditious attack at the U.S. Capitol to Monday’s jobs report, it is clear that our country is utterly failing to address the systemic racism and bias that have persisted for centuries – and have flourished since Donald Trump took office and began implementing his white supremacist agenda. We saw raw displays of white supremacy brandished by the violent mob that attacked our country’s Capitol last week, carrying confederate flags and wearing clothing bearing repugnant racist, white supremacist, anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant, and other offensive language.

“The kind of racism that drove that mob and resulted in pro-Trump insurrectionists breaching the Capitol is also embedded in more subtle, less violent but no less harmful forms throughout our society. Its impact on our economy, our jobs, our pervasive pay discrimination, our schools, our criminal justice system, our policing, and the social fabric of our country is corrosive. MomsRising will continue to follow the mandate from our members to fight for meaningful reform across our society, including in policing. Moms are ready for a real reckoning and the urgent, vitally important reform that will finally make America the fair, just place we aspire to be.”

-Statement of Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, Executive Director and CEO, MomsRising