In today’s update:

• Renew Your Membership
• Defund the Police: What’s It Mean?
• Stand With Pride by the LGBTQ Community

Renew Your Membership

The dues year is July 1, 2020 to June 30, 2021. If you’ve already renewed your membership, thank you! If not, it’s easy to renew online or by mail.

Defund the Police: What’s It Mean?

The term “defund the police” has been in the news and is frequently misunderstood. AAUW National included this explanation in their AAUW Mission & Action Newsletter:

The language “defund the police” may be misunderstood. Instead, our partner organization The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights recommends framing the issue of police funding this way:

• Our nation’s spending priorities are skewed: We spend billions to maintain mass criminalization and incarceration, while neglecting social services.
• Our country needs to transform its approach to public safety. Police cannot and should not solve every problem. The people who most need safety often feel too afraid to call the police.
• The safest communities in America are places that don’t center the police.

Is defunding the police an issue that AAUW should support? There may be conversations at the national, state, and local level and it’s important for members to be informed.

Stand With Pride by the LGBTQ Community

In June, the U.S. Supreme Court held that workers cannot be fired for being gay or transgender — a major victory for the LGBTQ community that came in the middle of this year’s Pride month. It’s a win for AAUW as well, as our Public Policy Priorities affirm our commitment to “vigorous protection of and full access to civil and constitutional rights,” and to “freedom in definition of family and guarantee of civil rights in all family structures.”

But, as with all social change, progress comes in fits and starts — and frequent setbacks. Just last week, the Trump administration announced it is eliminating an important regulation prohibiting discrimination in health care against transgender patients. That same week, as Black Lives Matter protests continued across the U.S., two Black transgender women were killed within 24 hours, prompting a fresh wave of demonstrations to support black trans lives.

Remind policymakers that America’s civil rights laws should include everyone. Learn more about LGBTQ rights — and then urge your members of Congress to pass the Equality Act, which would amend federal civil rights legislation to provide explicit protection against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

From AAUW Mission & Action Newsletter