Stacey Abrams helped a newly formed advocacy group launch a nationwide bus tour Sunday that aims to train and mobilize 2 million women to become political activists and organizers ahead of the 2020 election.
The Georgia Democrat, the runner-up in last year's gubernatorial election, kicked off the new initiative by Supermajority with a speech to hundreds in Atlanta who broke into applause when she recounted how she refused to concede to Gov. Brian Kemp.
“As women, we are taught there are certain rules we have to follow,” she said, adding: “We are taught that it’s our responsibility to meekly accept the outcome and to trust the rules as they were written down. I don’t.”
Supermajority was founded earlier this year by several well-known liberal leaders: Alicia Garza, who helped start Black Lives Matter; Katherine Grainger, a partner with Civitas Public Affairs Group; Ai-jen Poo, executive director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance; Cecile Richards, the former president of Planned Parenthood; Jess Morales Rocketto, the alliance’s political director; and Deirdre Schifeling, a Planned Parenthood adviser.
The group’s new “Majority Rules” program establishes a guiding philosophy for the organization that includes demands for a more tolerant society, equal pay for women, support for abortion rights and a more diverse government.
“You don’t need to be a policy expert to know exactly what is right, to know that equality is not negotiable and to be clear about what matters most,” said Poo, as she introduced the group’s agenda.
The 19-stop bus tour will feature stops with several Democratic White House hopefuls, including U.S. Sens. Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren; former Housing Secretary Julian Castro; and Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana.
Richards said Supermajority plans to be a lasting force in U.S. politics, saying organizers are “building the biggest, most bad-ass group of women across the country.”
“We are no longer a special interest. We are the super-majority in the United States of America,” Richards said.
Abrams, who passed on a U.S. Senate run to expand her voting rights initiative nationwide, said next year’s vote is a make-or-break moment for the nation.
“Our world is at stake, because the values that made us the strongest nation in the world — those values are being shaken,” said Abrams, who slammed Republicans who “celebrate racism and misogyny, who revel in their xenophobia, who put children in cages and call it good, or worse, look away and say, ‘It doesn’t really matter because they’re not us.’”
And as she does at most public appearances, Abrams urged the crowd to stay energized through next year’s election and to mobilize other Georgians who might skip the vote.
“We’re not going to shut up. This is our nation,” said Abrams. “These are our people. And it’s our responsibility: When the rules are broken, you fix them. When the system is broken, you take it over.”
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