Dear John,
In a heart-wrenching feature this week, Ms. reporter Amy Polacko explains what led to the death of Catherine Kassenoff—a brilliant attorney and mother of three, who took her own life after enduring years of tortured decisions by a dysfunctional family court system. Kassenoff lost custody of her three daughters, and was forced into a costly custody battle with her husband, a litigator who she says manipulated the legal system after physically abusing one of their children.
“I cannot survive this torment and the grief that comes from such a prolonged separation from my children,” she wrote in a final letter. “This court system did this to me, as it does to countless other protective mothers (and fathers) ... It is a predatory system that functions in darkness—through ‘gag’ orders like the one in my case, through a publicly-inaccessible docket, through a closed courtroom and through ex parte ‘temporary’ orders that are in place for years.”
Kassenoff’s case—which Ms. followed over several years, along with many similar ones that Ms. has reported on—illustrates the horrors the system can inflict on mothers fighting for their children, while costing them every last cent they may have and traumatizing them and their children in the process. It’s a system that must change.
In a ruling that caught many voting and civil rights advocates by surprise, on Thursday the Supreme Court rejected an Alabama congressional voting map that diluted the political power of Black voters and diminished the chances of electing more than one African American member of Congress from among Alabama’s seven districts. In the 5-4 ruling, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Kavanaugh joined the Court’s liberal members to uphold the district court’s preliminary injunction. A new map would likely add a second majority Black district to the state’s congressional delegation.
The decision could lead to similar challenges in several other southern states, including Texas, Louisiana, Georgia and South Carolina, where Black and Latino voters have been similarly packed into racially gerrymandered districts. In the meantime, the Alabama attorney general has vowed to continue litigating the case in the lower court.
The ruling is being heralded as a victory for the Voting Rights Act—which the Court has been notoriously hostile towards in recent years. But judicial experts expressed caution—as Ms. contributor and NYU Law professor Melissa Murray pointed out on Twitter, the ruling does nothing to strengthen the VRA—it merely preserves the status quo.
“Yes, today's decision is a victory that maintains the status quo for Section 2 of the VRA,” she wrote. “But it is cold comfort when one considers the way this Court through its decisions has actively distorted the electoral landscape and made true representative government more elusive.”
Going on one year later, we’re continuing to report on the fallout from the Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson. One of these consequences is an increased worry over digital surveillance, and the threat of abortion seekers and providers having their data leveraged against them in abortion-related cases. And as we know, this fear has proved very real—we’ve seen lawsuits emerge that cite supposedly private digital communications in prosecuting abortion seekers.
This week, the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) has released a set of best practices for companies that collect user data to ensure they’re adequately protecting the safety and privacy of abortion seekers and providers. These include minimizing the collection of personal information, more transparency about data collection, and implementing strict processes when it comes to handling law enforcement requests for data.
“As consumers, we can protect ourselves by being smart about the companies we entrust with our data and demanding more from companies to help protect our rights,” wrote CDT president and CEO Alexandra Reeve Givens with Ms.’ Jennifer Weiss-Wolf.
In the face of these threats, you can count on Ms. to continue delivering the feminist news you need—our forthcoming Summer issue delves into the new Florida law that could decimate degree programs in women’s and gender studies, Africana, ethnic and queer studies, and so much more. Join now to learn more!
Onward for equality,
