Member Statements on PCR01: Make the Bodily Autonomy Working Group a Chapter Priority Campaign for 2025

Member Statements
1

Statement IN FAVOR

Joe R.

I’m writing a member statement IN FAVOR of granting the Bodily Autonomy Working Group priority campaign status in 2025.

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC)’s targeting of the first ever transgender congresswoman-elect, the proposed transphobic bathroom bill, and the prospect of the Supreme Court denying healthcare to trans kids nationwide are just the opening salvos in what we expect to be four years of aggressive attacks on bodily autonomy of all kinds — from abortion, birth control pills, and IVF to government enforcement of the gender binary and gender-affirming care. From our position in mostly “safe” states, we can expect more internally displaced femme, queer, and trans people than ever who need to cross state lines for critical services or who choose to move rather than stay in a “ban” state. Our working group has been preparing for this harsh reality.

As an outgoing co-chair of the Trans & Queer Liberation Campaign, I’ve seen over the past year how the formation of this campaign, and more recently the working group, has grown immensely over the past year. Within seven months, we saw our first major victory with the passage of trans sanctuary legislation in Alexandria, and we are pushing for (and expect) more to follow in Arlington and other Virginia cities. We’ve quickly established a group of a few dozen members, many of them new or recently (re)engaged in chapter organizing, who are willing to table at and turn out for public actions and events, canvass for reproductive freedom and Project Sanctuary, own and implement new initiatives like our Gender & Name Change clinics, develop and launch a national pressure campaign in less than a week, and more. We’ve reached the point where we have enough engaged members to form subcommittees for Mutual Aid, Onboarding, and Project Sanctuary, and we have a clear and expansive vision for the coming year. We are the largest chapter in the country with a consolidated, fighting, and growing formation focused on reproductive justice and trans/queer liberation, and thus will play a critical role in these efforts nationally.

Most of our planned activities - direct actions, canvassing and phone/text banking, mutual aid, local and state legislative advocacy - have recurring expenses and the working group would benefit from having readily accessible funds. We’ve already seen a lot of new femme, queer, and trans members coming into the chapter through this campaign, particularly since the election, and we expect to see many more flowing into the chapter with each draconian policy or incendiary comment coming out of the next administration. Our working group has ongoing activities and campaigns with many low- and mid-level tasks that have allowed new members to get involved quickly, and we hope to connect people to the work they’re interested in even more efficiently by developing an onboarding subcommittee. This working group presents a real opportunity to grow our membership, provide material support to comrades facing severe attacks, and see some tangible wins for the chapter in the coming year.

Please vote YES to grant BAWG priority campaign status in 2025!

In solidarity
Joe R

2

Statement IN FAVOR

Vee D.

The Bodily Autonomy Working Group is fighting for a world where everyone can live with dignity and respect. By advocating for reproductive justice, trans liberation, and queer rights, they are challenging the systems of oppression that have held our communities back for far too long.

Their work is crucial to creating a society where everyone has the freedom to make their own decisions about their health, their well-being, and their lives. From organizing rallies and protests to advocating for policy changes at the local and state level, the Bodily Autonomy Working Group has already made significant progress in this fight.

But the incoming repressive administration is emboldening far-right extremists and threatening to roll back the progress we’ve made. We’re already seeing a surge in hate crimes and harassment targeting our most vulnerable community members. It’s more important than ever that we stand together to protect and uplift those who are most at risk.

That’s why I strongly support making the Bodily Autonomy Working Group a priority campaign for 2025. By doing so, we can amplify their efforts and bring more people into the fight for bodily autonomy. We can build a movement that is strong enough to challenge the far right’s agenda of oppression and win real victories for our community.

This campaign is not just about policy changes or electoral victories - it’s about creating a world where everyone can live with dignity and respect. It’s about recognizing that our bodies are our own, and that we have the right to make our own decisions about our health, our well-being, and our lives.

In the face of rising repression and hate, we must be bold and unapologetic in our defense of our community. We must be willing to take risks and challenge the status quo in order to create a world that is truly just and equitable.

Let’s stand together in support of the Bodily Autonomy Working Group and fight for a world where everyone can live with dignity and respect. Let’s make 2025 a year of progress and victory for our community.

3

Statement IN FAVOR

Xander D.

In light of recent events, the urgency of defending and fighting for the rights and safety of our trans siblings has become painfully clear. The Trump administration has made it explicit that they intend to dismantle policies that protect marginalized groups and deny them access to life-saving care. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has signaled its willingness to side with these oppressive measures rather than uphold the health and liberty of the very people it is meant to serve. With a Republican-controlled Congress and an anti-LGBTQ+ fascist in the Oval Office, we, the people, are the last line of defense against injustice and harm.

As a newer member of the Chapter I was drawn here because I realized I was surrounded by people who not only envision a more equitable future but to actively create it. We are not armchair socialists; we uphold our principles through our action. Thus we would be betraying ourselves if we allowed this level of injustice to continue. The fight for trans liberation cannot and must not be stopped. As the Metro DC chapter, our proximity to the nation’s capital places us in a unique position to lead this charge, both nationally and locally. We have the opportunity—and the responsibility—to set a powerful example for TRBA campaigns across the country.

We cannot allow the Right to continue treating the trans community as second-class citizens, stripped of basic liberties and respect. Nor can we let the Neoliberal Democrats continue to turn a blind eye to the oppression of trans people while playing an active role in perpetuating it. Comrades, the stakes are too high, as anti-trans legislation sweeps across the nation at an alarming rate. From bathroom bans that criminalize trans existence in public spaces and create environments of hostility and violence, to gender-affirming care bans that guarantee increased suicidality and suffering among trans youth, these laws are a direct assault on trans lives and freedoms.

The actions of the Trump administration, even within its first year, threaten to leave lasting scars on trans individuals and their communities. Our time to fight is now—before the damage becomes irreversible. I urge you to vote for BAWG as a priority campaign. By this time next year, it may already be too late.

4

Statement IN FAVOR

Lyra M.

I am writing to encourage you to vote in FAVOR of PCR01 and make Bodily Autonomy a Priority Campaign. Reproductive and LGBTQIA+ rights are on the front lines of the fight against the far right and for working class liberation. We fight to win and secure material improvements for some of the most marginalized and vulnerable in our communities; access to reproductive healthcare, gender-affirming care, affordable housing, and legal protections for trans and LGBTQIA+ people. We fight for, and demand, the basic human right of self-determination and power over our own lives and identities.

As the far right attacks on our bodily autonomy have increased this year we have been fighting back, and winning. We helped lead, win and secure reproductive freedom in Maryland through the Question 1 ballot initiative. We organized and led the campaign that resulted in the City of Alexandria adopting the first Trans & Queer (LGBTQIA+) Sanctuary in Virginia. We’ve packed and delivered more than 700 reproductive care kits to DCAF and organizations in West Virginia. We’ve shown solidarity for our community through numerous actions, most recently at the Skrmetti case hearing at the Supreme Court where we managed to make national press, raising consciousness and drawing additional awareness to our demands for the liberation and dignity of all in our community.

The fascist attacks have accelerated rapidly in the wake of the election and our position adds additional demands on our capacity to meet the fight with the full weight of the chapter behind us. Our leadership on the bodily autonomy front and our access to the federal legislature has resulted in requests from the national Trans Rights & Bodily Autonomy campaign to assist with developing and implementing pressure campaigns and strategies to resist the oncoming federal legislative onslaught. We are leading the fight locally as well as nationally against the attacks on reproductive and LGBTQIA+ rights (especially trans rights).

We have been planning for this moment and these attacks. We have been building coalitions and relationships with local and national left organizations such as the DC Dyke March, the Gender Liberation Movement, Trans Pride DC, and the DC Abortion Fund. We have recruited from our community outreach and grown our capacity and capability across all of our initiatives and are already accelerating our mutual aid community survival initiatives including weekly gender marker clinics through the end of December, but adding emergency housing relocation support networks and accelerating our planned fund raising event cadence for supporting our community organizations doing much needed support work.

We have an ambitious plan for mobilization through mass scale community support (leveraging lessons from the Black Panthers) that entails creating a parallel 501(c)(3) to do grant based and crowd sourced contribution funding for providing emergency rent support as gender and reproductive care micro grants in the name of DSA as well as funding disbursements to other organizations such as HIPS and DCAF.

To get these objectives accomplished, and support the level of direct action we anticipate as we respond to the frequent and accelerating attacks, we need the budget for literature, for use of scale2win to drive action mobilization and for spaces for fundraising and political education events. Making Bodily Autonomy a priority campaign will give us the resources we need to fight and win.

5

Statement IN FAVOR

Ken B.

Comrades, I hope you will join me this year in making the Bodily Autonomy Working Group a priority campaign. This will be a critical issue in the coming year as reproductive freedom and trans rights come under increased attack at the federal level as well as the state level (particularly in Virginia). Though only recently formed, the Bodily Autonomy Working Group has proven itself as a dedicated and effective formation, packing reproductive care kits for DC Abortion Fund, setting up gender & name change clinics to provide community survival support for vulnerable trans comrades in the DMV, successfully passing trans sanctuary legislation in Alexandria, Virginia, and knocking nearly 5,000 doors for Maryland Question 1, to enshrine reproductive freedom in the state constitution. This impressive record, as well as the thorough and detailed campaign plan submitted by the working group, leaves me thoroughly convinced that not a penny spent on this working group will go to waste, and they deserve our full support as a priority for 2025.

The Bodily Autonomy Working Group has ambitious plans for 2025. They plan to take our agenda to the streets with a number of protests and demonstrations already scheduled for the next year, and more sure to emerge. The BAWG also plans to expand our chapter’s mutual aid activity, specifically within their scope of LGBTQ rights and reproductive justice, however this will build out infrastructure that can be used for a variety of mutual aid and political education projects. Something I am particularly excited about is the plan to build up and utilize a chapter 501(c)(3) organization. Funded by tax-deductible voluntary contributions, this legal framework would help us support coalition partners such as HIPS and DCAF as well as our own community support programs. A 501(c)(3) could also be used to house much of our political education work and even electoral work such as voter registration and GOTV, and could even be used to shelter an office or other physical space for the chapter to use as a central hub. BAWG will also use these resources to engage electorally and legislatively, expanding their push for trans sanctuary legislation, helping unions fight to put language guaranteeing reproductive rights and trans healthcare in their contracts, and engaging electorally to get socialist candidates who will protect bodily autonomy in office.

I believe that for these reasons, this campaign is critical to the success and growth of our chapter in the next year, and it should get priority status. Trans rights and reproductive freedom are some of the biggest priorities of the right wing to attack, so they need to be our biggest priorities to defend. I am sure this will be an excellent campaign and a wise investment of resources that will lead to real change in our region and growth for our chapter.

6

Statement IN FAVOR

Miranda E.

I urge you to vote in favor of PCR01 and make the Bodily Autonomy Working Group a chapter priority campaign for 2025.

The ability of working class people to access reproductive healthcare and maintain full rights to their bodily autonomy are socialist concerns. Attacks on bodily autonomy, including restrictions on accessing abortion and gender-affirming care, are increasingly pervasive across the country, and under a second Trump presidency, these rights are under heightened risk.

The Reproductive Justice campaign has coordinated two successful reproductive healthcare kit packing events and is actively planning our third this January, hosted fundraisers for the DC Abortion Fund, co-sponsored protests with other feminist and LGBTQ+ organizations, helped coordinate canvassing for Maryland’s reproductive freedom amendment, hosted our first Socialist Night School, and more.

And in the short amount of time the Trans Rights + Queer Liberation campaign has existed, it has already made an enormous impact in the DC/NoVa community–organizing the campaign that led to Alexandria becoming the first LGBTQIA+ sanctuary in Virginia, coordinating gender and name change clinics, and more.

The Bodily Autonomy Working Group is not only a powerful organizing force but also an important space for women and LGBTQ+ people in the chapter.

After the election, the Bodily Autonomy Working Group received a huge surge in interest, reflecting the way that bodily autonomy is at the forefront for many folks right now. New chapter members tell us that they joined DSA specifically to organize for reproductive justice and trans and queer liberation.

More members means we will be able to do more for our community, grow our pipeline of chapter leaders, mitigate burnout, and serve as a bulwark against increasing threats to marginalized people. But we need the funds and other resources in order to do so–to book spaces for political education events and care kit packing events, print materials like our zine, one-pagers and other collateral for tabling and events, text banking, purchasing items for our care kits, and more.

The resources that come with priority campaign status will help our working group fund critical actions in our community including making Arlington the second sanctuary city in Virginia, fundraising for local abortion funds, hosting more frequent reproductive care kit packing events and gender- and name-change clinics, facilitating political education programs, hosting community events, and more, during this critical time.

7

Statement IN FAVOR

Carl R.

Comrades, I am asking you to vote FOR the Bodily Autonomy Working Group to become a priority campaign. I believe this work will be incredibly important in the coming four years. Far right control of the federal government means that the right to an abortion and to be yourself - loving who you love and identifying as who you are - are already under attack. Our chapter has proven it can successfully fight back against this, and the organizing plan laid out in the Priority Campaign application is one that can win tangible gains, recruit new members into DSA, and make Metro DC DSA the fighting organization for reproductive justice and trans liberation in the DMV.

8

Statement IN FAVOR

Alex Y.

Lyra alone has done so much work for this group to make it is today. Repro justice has also continued to grow their already large presence. Both are on the frontline of rights that are under attack and that will only get more and more important after January 20th. I could go on, but I think this group is well deserving of priority campaign staus.

9

Statement IN FAVOR

Tim S.

I’m writing to ask you to join me in voting for the Bodily Autonomy Working Group’s priority campaign application. This group has been really effective at getting out into the community to agitate all over the DMV, at bringing in new members, and at winning legislative fights, all without being a priority campaign, and I think giving them the resources they’re asking for to carry out the detailed campaign plan they’ve submitted (which I encourage you to read!) will be a great way to take advantage of their momentum. Bodily autonomy, by pretty much any definition, is already under aggressive attack by the right wing and the Democrats who don’t think standing up for it is worthwhile. There are thousands of people in our region at grave risk from these attacks, and we have a great opportunity to lead the way on standing in solidarity with them. We also have an opportunity to bring in not only trans people, people in need of reproductive care, and people who fear further escalation, but also great numbers of progressives who are increasingly disillusioned with the Democrats’ fecklessness on bodily autonomy issues. This is a great arena in which to demonstrate our principles in a way that’s oppositional to the failures of both parties to stand up for the needs of the working class, and I hope you’ll join me in voting for the Bodily Autonomy Working Group’s priority status so we can stand up and make that demonstration.

10

Statement IN FAVOR

Emily N.

The Bodily Autonomy Working Group has it all: Mutual Aid, Legislative organizing Direct action. Electoral projects. Canvassing. Pressure campaigns on electeds. Close tie-ins with other longstanding chapter priorities. An organizing project in every region of our chapter.

In the few short months since our Reproductive Justice Working Group and Trans Rights and Bodily Autonomy Campaign came together to form BAWG, it has been clear that this working group is one to watch. From committing time to canvassing for Question 1 to enshrine reproductive freedom in the Maryland State constitution to organizing our first successful Gender and Name Change Clinic in Maryland, not to mention the success this fall of getting Alexandria to become the first trans sanctuary in Virginia, the organizers that power this group’s work are dedicated, strategic, creative, and incredibly passionate.

Priority Campaign status would mean so much for the work we plan to do in 2025. It will provide us with the resources we need to create more trans sanctuaries throughout Northern Virginia, including support on targeted canvassing if pressuring electeds proves necessary. It will mean we can be more nimble in responding to the coming deluge of right wing attacks on women and trans folks. It will allow us to do even more community outreach and bring in members seeking a political home and sense of community as we witness the continued rise of the far right.

Trans folks will be among the first under attack by the incoming administration and the recent threats to gender affirming care in the NDAA signal a more than willing Congress. This working group is already busy preparing to support those most impacted, and we have brought in dozens of new members as we turn our focus to the coming years and the work that will need to be done.

I emphatically encourage you to vote yes and make the Bodily Autonomy Working Group a priority campaign for 2025. The rise of fascism threatens us all, and we need to be ready to fight for people we don’t know and for the communities most vulnerable to attack. Being a chapter priority will make our DSA chapter best equipped to lead on this fight both regionally and nationally.

11

Statement IN FAVOR

Aparna R.

Hi everyone, I hope you vote yes for the Bodily Autonomy Working Group for priority campaign status. The working group has already done so much great work to try to try to protect reproductive rights and trans rights for people across the region, even without priority campaign status. They’ve held name change clinics and reproductive care kit packing events, they’ve lobbied to get cities in Virginia to declare themselves as trans sanctuary cities, and they endorsed and canvassed for Maryland Question 1 to enshrine the right to abortion in the state constitution.

I think it’s really important for the Bodily Autonomy Working Group to have priority status to expand their work, especially under the threats of a Trump administration. We’ve already seen the way that conservatives and some prominent Democrats have tried to throw trans people under the bus, and our Bodily Autonomy Working Group has moved swiftly to try to push back on those efforts. They are also currently working to oppose a part of the proposed NDAA that would ban gender affirming care for trans dependents of US military personnel. They’ve grown really impressively over the last year and have been building really important, effective campaigns. We’re likely to see more attacks on trans people and on reproductive rights over the next administration, and it is vitally important that we prioritize the work the Bodily Autonomy Working Group as they work to defend and expand these rights in the coming years.

12

Statement IN FAVOR

Stuart K.

I’m voting for the Bodily Autonomy Working Group to receive priority campaign status on 2025. I urge fellow chapter members to do the same.

During the first Donald Trump presidency, bodily autonomy rights came under attack like never before. These attacks will only get worse during Trump’s upcoming second term. We must come together not only to protect those rights, but also to secure new victories in the fight for reproductive justice, LGBTQ+ liberation, and an end to oppressive patriarchal systems.

Please vote for the Bodily Autonomy Working Group to be a chapter priority!

13

Statement IN FAVOR

Ralph C.

Hello comrades,

I am Ralph C, and I urge you to support making the Bodily Autonomy Working Group a Chapter Priority Campaign for 2025. The right to bodily autonomy is foundational to all other human rights—it is essential to the dignity, freedom, and safety of every individual. This is particularly true for our transgender and gender non-conforming comrades, who will face the Trump regime, who campaigned on a far right agenda of state violence and repression. In our nation’s capital, where key policy decisions are made, we have an opportunity and a responsibility to lead the fight for total liberation and the absolute right of choice and free expression.

The Bodily Autonomy Working Group is uniquely positioned to make a real difference in the fight for trans rights and the broader protection of bodily autonomy. We have already seen the fruit of the work. Almost 5,000 doors were knocked in Maryland to gather support for the Reproductive Freedom Amendment, which overwhelmingly won passage. Trans/Queer Liberation Campaign organizers won the first of many victories, when Alexandria became the first jurisdiction in Virginia to adopt a sanctuary resolution for LGBTQIA+ people. And the organizers held a name change clinic in Hyattsville, this being the first in a line of initiativies building out the Community Survival Program. It is incumbent on us as a chapter to not lose a single ounce of momentum, and build these efforts into larger campaigns throughout all of the jurisdiction in the DMV.

I urge the chapter to take a serious stance in 2025 by making the Bodily Autonomy Working Group a central priority.