Issue Position: Women, healthy families and survivors: strengthening our communities

Issue Position

Antoinette has been a longtime advocate for women. From her time teaching on Women and the Law, to working to eliminate domestic violence in New Mexico as the head of Enlace Comunitario, she has been devoted to championing women's and children's rights throughout her career.

Antoinette believes strongly that women need to be in control of their bodies and their own healthcare decisions. These personal and private decisions are not the government's business. She will fight to protect a woman's right to health care services, including access to critical preventative care services like mammograms and ovarian cancer screenings, access to clean and safe abortion care, and access to contraceptives. In addition to ensuring birth control coverage and access to safe abortion services, Antoinette will fight pregnancy discrimination that too often is forgotten as an essential part of reproductive freedom.

As the former head of an anti-domestic violence agency, ending violence and in particular violence against women is a deeply personal challenge that Antoinette will continue to fight for in Congress. As a trained lawyer and law professor, she will continue to draw on her experiences to expand federal funding for improved testing, better tracking of rape kits, and robust services for survivors. She'll also work to eliminate the statute of limitations on sexual assault cases, and will use Congress' oversight role to hold the Department of Justice accountable on these issues. Antoinette believes we need to build on the Violence Against Women Act's (VAWA) successes and devote additional federal resources so that local law enforcement can adequately tackle the challenge of keeping survivors and families safe.

Antoinette will also fight for paid family leave, closing the gender wage gap, child care affordability for working families, and co-sponsoring the FAMILY ACT, which would create a national insurance program offering families up to 12 weeks of leave.

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