Removing Deadline for Ratification of Equal Rights Amendment

Floor Speech

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Ms. UNDERWOOD. Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.J. Res. 79, a bipartisan bill that moves us closer to adopting the equal rights amendment.

Madam Speaker, American women are barrier breakers. We have broken down barriers and shattered glass ceilings in education, at work, in the law, in the military, and at home. We are in a new era where women are leading in ways that they never have before, but legal gender discrimination, pay disparities, and inequality remain. They will not go away on their own. That is why we need to ensure that women's rights are guaranteed by adopting the equal rights amendment.

I was so proud in 2018 when Illinois ratified the equal rights amendment at long last. Two years later, I am here on the House floor because the women of northern Illinois sent me here to fight for them. I am here to fight for our right as women to equal treatment under the Constitution of our great country.

Madam Speaker, I urge all my colleagues to move us one giant step closer to legal equality by supporting this essential bill.

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