Dear White Women Voters, Who Will Decide the Future

We can—for better or worse. We’re 36 percent of all US voters.

Oct 22, 2024

Women dressed in white in a suffragist parade in New York 1912 — Photo credit: Library of Congress. Youngest parader in New York City suffragist parade, 1912.

Dear White Women Voters,

Every election since 1980, American women—as a whole—voted in greater numbers than men.

That number could have been even higher because not all registered voters showed up at the polls, a third to a half of them stayed home instead.

That’s a tremendous amount of untapped power to determine the course of the US, even the world.

A little more than a century ago, the fear of women joining forces was one reason why many people didn’t want women to have the right to vote at all.

Fellow white women, 36 percent of US voters, what are you going to do with your one precious vote this year? The one you’ll cast inside a booth or mark on a sheet that our current election process ensures is private. A ballot that is—for some, including top-ranking Republicans—a test of conscience: to vote for democratic values rather than the undermining of them.

What future do you want for yourself, the people you love, and the human beings you don’t know whose lives hang in the balance of your choice?

Do you want an economy that provides working people with what they need instead of more breaks for people who don’t need them? I do.

I grew up in a household where money was tight and, through my young adult years, often lived paycheck to paycheck. I have friends and family who are underemployed, have little or no savings, who struggle to meet their bills. Like everyone else who isn’t rich, I worry about my household budget and the economy overall.

One election isn’t going to fix everything, but who is elected can influence what improves or gets worse.

The inflation rate will be higher with Trump’s economic proposals, says two-thirds of the economists polled by the Wall Street Journal. (Aside from inflation, things are so expensive because of extreme weather, crop diseases, high energy costs, ongoing supply issues from the pandemic, and—some claim—corporate greed.) The federal deficit—which is when the government spends more than it takes in, like taxes—will go up by $4.1 trillion under Trump, compared to $2 trillion with Harris, according to the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business.

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Regarding taxes, high-income households will more likely benefit from Trump’s policies while Harris’ proposals would tax wealthier people to cover assistance for lower- and middle-income families, according Forbes report last week. Trump supports raising the current child tax credit limit from $2,000 per child to $5,000. Harris proposes a $6,000 for infants; $3,600 annually for children between ages one and six; and $3,000 for those between ages seven and 17.

Neither candidate plans to cut Social Security. Neither has shared details about how they would expand Medicare, such as including dental and vision coverage, or if they would suggest cuts.

Harris, who grew up in a middle-class household with a single mother, worked at McDonald’s between her first two years in college. Trump grew up very wealthy and worked for his father’s real estate business.

The candidates’ websites give more information on their economic positions. I noticed the Harris site has more specifics with attached numbers (https://kamalaharris.com/issues/) compared to generalizations on Trump’s. (https://www.donaldjtrump.com/platform).

Are you concerned about threats to our democracy? I definitely am.

In school, I learned about our country’s voting process—how it works, the values behind it, the checks and balances that ensure it functions. My family modeled what it meant to be a good citizen—pay attention to the news, respect people’s differences, and show up to vote.

In 1920, the 19^th Amendment gave American women the right to vote. However, Black women were kept from this right because of laws designed to stop them (and Black men, too), such as requiring literacy tests and paying poll taxes. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 changed all that.

Then, in 2013, the Supreme Court overturned a provision in the Act that made it easier for local and state governments to change voting laws to suppress votes or discriminate against certain groups. Ever since, many states have passed laws that make it harder to vote—ones that affect Black and other minority groups far more than white voters. These barriers include restricting registration periods, cutting the times when people can vote, having strict voter ID requirements, and taking names off the voter rolls.

That’s not democratic. That’s an attempt to tip the scales and hinder people’s right to decide who represents them and who makes the laws they’re expected to follow.

In 2020, the election didn’t go the way Trump and his supporters wanted, but nothing illegal happened. There was no steal to stop. What occurred on January 6, 2021—when mobs rushed into the US Capitol—wasn’t a disagreement over election results. It was an attempt to override our democratic voting and election certification process. In simpler terms—to overturn a free and fair election.

THAT is a threat to democracy.

So is Trump’s threat against “the enemy from within…[who] should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military,” which he said on Maria Bartiromo’s Sunday Morning Futures. While many disagree on issues and policies, our citizenry, for centuries, has held to the tenet that each party tries to prevail in the next election—not fine, imprison, harass, or kill their opponents.

Harris has made no such threats. Given what happened January 6, Trump isn’t kidding.

Do you think the government should keep out of someone’s personal business about abortion? I vote for that.

Thirty-five years ago, as a college student, I went to my university’s library to find out whether abortion was legal in Louisiana. My period was late, and I wondered how I’d find the money to go out of state if I had to. I didn’t know Roe v. Wade—which conveyed the constitutional right to abortion throughout the US—ensured I could make that choice for myself right where I lived. I wasn’t pregnant, but that terror woke me up to how much I wanted the freedom to make decisions about my own body, life, and future.

No adult can be forced against their will to donate an organ, give blood to a bank, or submit to a medical procedure. Considering that, no one should be forced to be pregnant when they don’t want to be. This is bodily autonomy—the right to make decisions about what happens to you.

When Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, states rushed to restrict their laws. Soon after, nearly one in three US women of reproductive age—almost 22 million people—lived where abortion was severely restricted or unavailable. Currently, more than 20 states have bans, some near-total. An unpleasant fact—the states that restrict abortion also provide little support for women and children in general, like having more families in poverty, fewer reproductive health care providers, and high maternal death rates, to list a few.

The abortion bans don’t only affect women who want to make this decision for themselves. It’s a nightmare for those who are miscarrying or have serious pregnancy complications. States with the most restrictive laws, such as Texas and Georgia, force doctors to worry about being prosecuted and delays the care their patients need. Women have died—and will continue to die—because of this.

I care about women in emergencies who can’t get medical attention because they live in the wrong state. Trump is proud to claim he ended Roe v. Wade and believes this issue should be up to the states now. In America, shouldn’t every person have the same rights to protect their health and decide their future no matter where they live?

I also care about a young woman who might want to be a parent one day, but not now, not before she gets her associate’s degree. Or a 42-year-old woman with three children she loves but can’t afford a fourth. Or a 28-year-old woman with one child who’s underemployed and has to leave an abusive spouse. Whatever the reason—it’s her right.

Harris supports reproductive freedom—birth control, abortion, IVF—nationwide. Trump does not. Once upon a time, the conservative position on reproductive rights was the government kept out of it. That’s something great to go back to.

What about looking at the facts about immigration and having policies that are fair and offer dignity? I want that.

Starting in 1719, most of my ancestors—Swiss, German, Spanish, Scots-Irish, Belgian, French, and English—stepped foot on the North American continent without a single obstacle in their way. Historically, for more than two and a half centuries, the US had a rather open immigration policy. Some states had specific regulations, but it wasn’t until 1876 that the Supreme Court declared immigration as a federal responsibility.

By the time my Sicilian ancestors immigrated around the 1880s, there were far more regulations in place. I know from reading history about the period that, even though they arrived “legally,” my dark-skinned people who only spoke Italian endured discrimination and harassment. Many worked in manual labor jobs that were relegated to other dark-skinned people.

Within the past 20 years, I watched my state’s demographics change—starting right after Hurricane Katrina. Suddenly, the laborers I saw roofing houses, working construction, and doing other physically demanding jobs were immigrants from Mexico and Central America. My guess is, a lot of people didn’t care if they were here documented or not. The necessary work got done.

In 2007, during the Bush administration, the population of unauthorized immigrants was at its peak—12.2 million. As of 2022, that number was almost 11 million.

There’s more consensus about what must be done about immigration than you might expect. A significant majority—79 percent—believes in reforms that make a way for citizenship for those who came to the US as undocumented children, improve border security, and provide a legal workforce for the country’s ranchers and farmers. That’s from the National Immigration Forum. Almost three-fourths of Americans surveyed believe people come to the US mainly to improve their lives and find jobs, according to a Cato Institute report.

The facts about immigrants—documented or not—counter what’s spewed as rhetoric. Immigrants are not are overtaking federal assistance programs. They aren’t eligible for Medicare, CHIP, or Medicaid, all federally funded, or to get health insurance through the ACA. They face many restrictions for programs like food stamps (SNAP) and cash assistance (SSI and TANF). Immigrants are not taking jobs away from US-born workers; in fact, the labor market has been able to bring them into jobs at all income levels. Immigrants are less likely to commit crimes and be incarcerated than native-born people. Nationwide, undocumented immigrants have lower incarceration rates compared to native-born Americans. Law enforcement programs targeting noncitizens have no effect on crime rates.

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There’s no debate about whether immigration policy needs reform. The question is what to do. The 2024 bipartisan border bill, supported by Harris, included making a better process to evaluate asylum claims; ensuring only legal immigrants qualify for work permits; alternatives to detention such as ankle monitors and cell phones for check-ins; a mechanism to close the border if the daily average of migrants coming over is more than 5,000 over one week; and legal counsel for unaccompanied children under 13. Trump pressured Republicans to kill the bill, which they did. Some of Trump’s plans—build a border wall, end birthright citizenship for the children of unauthorized parents, require “ideological screening,” and implement mass deportation of 11 million people using the US military and National Guard.

Have you experienced worse weather, much warmer temperatures, and higher food costs? That’s because of climate change. I know a major shift must happen to slow it down.

When I was a child, I loved spring because that’s when the azaleas burst into pink, fuchsia, and white blooms, releasing the most delicate scent. As I grew up, I paid attention to when they emerged…and then, that changed. About 10 years ago, I realized they were blooming earlier. A couple of years ago, it was nearly a month too soon where I lived.

This is related to climate change. Warmer temperatures make the plants bloom sooner. While that might not seem like a big deal, it is for pollinators who depend on them. The blooms that die before they arrive means there’s no food for them—or the animals who eat the pollinators as part of the natural cycle.

Climate change is about shifts in weather patterns and the planet’s temperatures. Some of the shifts are part of nature, like from volcanic eruptions or sun activity. But for nearly 200 years, humans have been the main cause, mostly through burning fossil fuels like oil, gas, and coal. The change that’s happened since the middle of the twentieth century is unprecedented over thousands of years.

Why does burning fossil fuels warm the planet? Because fossil fuels are the remains of plants and animals that died millions of years ago. They were living organisms that contained carbon. When fossil fuels are taken from the earth and burned, this releases carbon into the atmosphere. Carbon mixed with oxygen in the air creates carbon dioxide, a gas that traps heat and makes the land and oceans warmer.

As the planet gets hotter, this makes our climate and weather more unpredictable. Extreme heat, stronger hurricanes, heavier rain, and other hazards happen more often. Since 1979, the number of major hurricanes has increased—and the toll on life and the costs to rebuild will intensify. We will continue to see food and water shortages escalate because of climate change.

The warming of the planet must be slowed to avoid deaths and catastrophic impacts on every human, plant, and creature. A huge shift in how we get our energy, travel from one place to another, and produce food cannot wait any longer. Renewable sources, like wind and solar, are the future.

Trump has called climate change “a hoax.” He’s repeated drill, baby, drill. Rephrase that to die, baby, die because even if that must continue in the short term, the long-term result will be mass destruction of ecosystems and life itself. A quick find search on his platform doesn’t include the words renewable, wind, or solar in terms of energy or the climate. Clean is related only to cities. Drill, baby, drill is in all caps.

Harris’ platform summarizes how she would handle the climate crisis. Her administration plans to build a clean energy program that will create new jobs, advance environmental justice for poor and minority people who are affected by hazards more often, and work to ensure clean water and air for all. As a US senator, she was an early cosponsor of the New Green Deal, which was a blueprint for clean energy transition. For me, she isn’t forward enough on this issue, but she doesn’t think it’s a hoax.

Do you believe every person deserves to be treated with respect, kindness, compassion, and dignity? I do.

I saved this for last knowing most readers dropped out sections ago. If you’ve made it this far, you’re committed to a hate read or giving real consideration to what’s being said here.

This election is about the economy, democracy, reproductive rights, immigration, climate change, and more. It’s particularly about humanity.

Middle-aged now, born and raised in the Deep South, I grew up in a culture that taught me in overt and indirect ways that Black people are less than—and so is everyone else who isn’t white—and that I’m supposed to be okay with the systems, laws, unspoken rules, and global wars that keep things this way. This same culture taught me to judge people who aren’t heterosexual or don’t act like the gender they appear to be. And I was taught, even more subtly, to pity or discount people with different abilities, as if they are less than, too.

I live by the maxim do unto others as you would have them do unto you. For me, that means everyone should have their needs met for food, clothes, housing, health care, and a welcoming community. It also means accepting people for who they are and what personal and intergenerational experiences shaped them. There’s no love the sinner but hate the sin. No disagreement with someone’s lifestyle. No belief or assumption someone’s health or circumstances reflect that they are inherently flawed.

Trump shows no regard for humanity. From the start of his 2016 campaign into his one term, remember how he mocked a reporter who is disabled; the leaked recording of “grab them by the pussy;” that he said Mexican immigrants were rapists who brought drugs and crime into the US; and that he referred to people from African countries and Haiti as coming from “shithole countries.” The 2024 campaign has been no better. He said his criminal indictments are “why the Black people like me because they have been hurt so badly and discriminated against, and they actually viewed me as I’m discriminated against.” He said about immigrants coming into the US that “…we got a lot of bad genes in our country right now.” He claimed Democrats are “pushing the transgender cult.”

I’m baffled that people who consider themselves good and decent align themselves with someone so blatantly cruel. I can’t fathom how this malicious person had—and unless he loses, will have again—the power to direct, order, and incite others to hurt millions of people and this planet.

I’m voting for Kamala Harris because…of course.

She’s closer aligned to what I value and because I see more decency, character, and compassion in her than her opponent. Her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, has shown what kind of leader he is, whose state provides school meals for all K-12 students, created a program to provide paid family and medical leave, and has a law protecting reproductive rights.

White women make up 36 percent of all US voters. If greater numbers get out to vote, and more choose Harris/Walz in the swing states and in the blue ones, they win. That’s the math.

Consider what’s at stake. Vote for Harris/Walz with pure joy, or conflicted reservation, or outright reluctance. This election is bigger than they are and their administration’s scope anyway. We’re at a collective fork in the road. What the people decide in two weeks will veer us into one potential future or another. I’m voting for what I hope will be, some distant day, and won’t live to see—a future that is fair, equitable, and inclusive with true liberty and justice for all.