In the days since the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Democrats have smashed fundraising records ($62 million in 12 hours), while Donald Trump vows the now vacant Supreme court position would be filled by a “brilliant woman”.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg is famous for her advocacy for equal rights for women. She is credited for helping pass the “Pregnancy Discrimination Act” which outlawed employers discriminating against gender or reproductive choices; led a ruling that outlawed state-funded schools refusing to admit women; and paved the way for the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, which allowed women to apply for bank accounts, credit cards, and mortgages without a male co-signer.
Significantly, Ruth Bader Ginsburg was considered a bastion for women and a key liberal figure on the Supreme court.
US citizens are due to head to the polls on November 3, or send in their ballots beforehand. Her death has reset the election campaign, thrusting women’s policy into the spotlight. How do the two candidates compare on women’s issues?
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, August 2013. Source: Getty
Kim Hoggard, a former US government official for the first Bush and Reagan administrations, told SBS Dateline Ginsburg’s death cannot be overstated.
“So it definitely brings [women’s issues] into stark relief and may certainly energise women to go out and vote,” said Ms Hoggard, who is now a non-resident fellow at the University of Sydney’s US Studies Centre.
She said that it is clear Biden has outlined a “very detailed” plan for specific policies that would benefit women, whereas Trump’s administration does not have a clear agenda on women's issues.
On the respective candidates’ campaign websites, Biden has a specific page outlining the “agenda” for women. Trump’s campaign links to a site where women “share their experiences and successes” during the Trump administration.
Here is how the pair stack up on three issues: reproductive rights, equal pay, and parental leave/child care.
Reproductive rights
Abortion is one of the more divisive political issues in the US, and Biden and Trump’s positions are very different.
President Donald Trump has said that he wants to overturn federal protections of the right to an abortion. He has said that there should be punishment for the person who performs an abortion, if it were to be banned.
Vice President Mike Pence is a Christian conservative, which solidifies the Trump administration’s anti-abortion position.
Trump has declared that he will choose Ginsburg’s replacement before the election, who will likely be a conservative and positioned against abortion.
Roe v Wade is the landmark Supreme Court ruling from 1973 established a women’s right to abortion on a national level. The Supreme Court has the power to overturn the ruling.
Trump’s campaign boasts that in his first week in office, the President reinstated and expanded the Mexico City Policy that prevented $12 billion US in foreign aid from being used to fund the abortion industry.
President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally on 21 Sepember, 2020, in Dayton, Ohio. Source: AAP
President Trump worked with Congress to sign a bill overturning an Obama administration regulation that prohibited states from defunding abortion service providers.
Biden’s campaign has stated his administration would protect a woman's right to choose and fight to keep access to abortion legal. He has called for the withdrawal of Trump's Supreme Court nominee if he wins the presidential election.
Biden’s position goes as far as “codifying” Roe v Wade so more conservative states have less power to move against it.
He has also pledged to restore federal funding to Planned Parenthood, a known provider of reproductive services including abortion.
Ms Hoggard said that the general public in the US have reconciled with the women’s right to abortion, with research surveys .
“This is an issue that has been resolved in the minds of most Americans,” she said.
Ms Hoggard said while the abortion is divisive, it may not become a key election issue.
Equal pay
The Biden campaign has explicitly acknowledged the gender pay gap and has outlined a number of sweeping promises that he claims will make the wage gap transparent and strengthen bargaining powers.
Biden says he’ll work with advocates across the country to pass the Equal Rights Amendment, so women’s rights are once and for all explicitly enshrined in the US Constitution.
Donald Trump has acknowledged in interviews that the pay gap exists. But in 2017, Donald Trump stopped an Obama-era rule meant to address the wage gap by requiring large companies to report to the government how much they pay employees by race and gender. A federal judge recently overruled the administration and revived the rule.
Democratic presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden. Source: AAP
Trump’s daughter, Ivanka, has promised that she and her father would fight for equal pay.
Maternity leave/child care
The Trump administration, pushed by Ivanka Trump, has moved forward to pass some paid family leave and affordable child care policies.
In 2016, Trump promised that he would push to “provide six weeks of paid maternity leave to any mother with a newborn child whose employer does not provide the benefit.”
Trump did sign legislation in December 2019 that granted 12 weeks paid parental leave to the estimated 2.1 million federal employees. However, it works by allowing people to borrow from their future selves and applies to a tiny fraction of Americans.
The Trump administration also doubled the child tax credit to $2,000USD, which is more available to families with significant earnings but offers little or nothing to many poor people. Biden said he would increase that same child tax credit to $8,000USD and make it available to a more extensive income bracket range.
The Biden campaign has said that it would aim to have all workers with 12 weeks of paid parental leave, going as far to require employers to permanently provide up to seven days of paid sick, family, and safe leave.
Biden is also making big promises to provide affordable high-quality child care on a “sliding scale” for low-income and middle-class families.
