Of course Trump threatened ballot access on the 19th Amendment's anniversary

With top brass in the Trump administration talking about whether women should have the right to vote, the fight this time is for all the marbles.

The 19th Amendment, ratified on Aug. 18, 1920, 105 years ago this week, marked a hard-won victory in the long march to women’s suffrage. (Cue the “SUFFS” soundtrack.) It took another 45 years and passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 for the full promise of civic equality to become a reality for women of color in this country.

Yet here we are in 2025, witnessing top brass in the Trump administration engage in public discourse about whether women in this country should have the right to vote.

You heard that right.

Two weeks ago, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth posted to X a video clip featuring Christian nationalist pastor Doug Wilson voicing his full-throated support for repeal of the 19th Amendment. “In my ideal society, we would vote as households,” pastor Toby Sumpter told CNN reporter Pamela Brown in defense of the idea. “I would ordinarily be the one that would cast the vote, but I would cast the vote having discussed it with my household.”

Hardly a one-off remark. Another pastor said when asked about repealing the 19th, “I would support that, and I’d support it on the basis that the atomization that comes with our current system is not good for humans.” A congregant admitted that she submits to her husband.

Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell made plain that Hegseth, a member of a church in Tennessee affiliated with Wilson’s Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches, holds his congregation dear. When a Slate reporter sought clarification on Hegseth’s view on women’s voting rights specifically, Parnell sent this reply: “The Secretary is a proud member of a church affiliated with the Congregation of Reformed Evangelical Churches, which was founded by Pastor Doug Wilson. The Secretary very much appreciates many of Mr. Wilson’s writings and teachings.”

A non-response that speaks volumes, as much as the very act of sharing the incendiary video. Several days later, when further pressed, the Pentagon clarified, “Of course, the secretary thinks that women should have the right to vote.”

But, of course! Silly us. Never mind we were accused of being hysterical when we saw the writing on the wall that Roe v. Wade would indeed be overturned. Or called hyperbolic for warning how the Supreme Court and congressional Republicans clearly have contraception in their sights. (The Contrarian last week covered the plan to set fire, literally, to a stockpile of IUDs and pills.) That Wilson went on to remark during the CNN interview “Women are the kind of people that people come out of” was no surprise.

We know how this story ends.

Which is why women’s voting rights are intrinsic to all of our voting rights—and matter now more than ever. As someone who once served as a chief fundraiser for a national democracy organization, I have written those words—“Your support matters now more than ever!”—more times than I could possibly count. But this time it really is for all the marbles.

On Monday, President Donald Trump took to Truth Social vowing to eliminate mail-in ballots and certain voting machines for the 2026 midterm elections. (Never mind that the president has no such authority to do so; only Congress and states themselves can set election rules.) He not only triggered a nationwide redistricting arms race, but as reported by the Brennan Center for Justice, the administration itself now also poses the most alarming threat to Americans’ ability to participate in free and fair elections.

Meanwhile, in Congress The SAVE Act is still alive and kicking. Mostly absent from the headlines since it passed the House in April, this massive voter disenfranchisement bill awaits debate in the Senate. Among the voters most likely to be impacted are married women—the as many as 69 million of whom take their spouse’s name and might not have the identification forms that would be required to register or cast a ballot.

Which brings us back to the August anniversary—what all means to acknowledge the long road to women’s suffrage, the ferocity of that fight, and the strategic long game played by generations of activists. Those lessons will serve us well, although now we have no choice but to move at warp speed.

Historically, women in the United States have participated voraciously in civic life, registering and voting at higher rates than men; Black women show up at the polls and in voter mobilization efforts in great numbers. It is no coincidence these dog whistles about women’s votes are piercing the veil simultaneously with attempts to broadly curb access to the ballot.

Which means it is on all of us to keep connecting these dots for each other. To keep showing up at townhalls and listening to one another. And to never back off from being the Cassandra in the crowd. We know what we stand to lose.

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf is executive director of the Birnbaum Women’s Leadership Center at NYU School of Law. She also leads strategy and partnerships at Ms. Magazine.

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