Out100 2022: LGBTQ+ Policy Makers and Advocates Changing the World – Out Magazine
A veteran in the fight for reproductive freedom, Rebecca Hart Holder had a sense that Roe v. Wade’s overturning was imminent and made a tactical decision to take the fight to where she could affect the most change.
“I began my work in abortion access at the federal level nearly 14 years ago. However, I soon realized that protecting abortion access in the U.S. Senate wasn’t going to be possible with the filibuster in place and slim Democratic majorities,” Hart Holder says. “I have for a very long time believed that the fall of Roe was coming and, so, pivoted to state-based work nearly a decade ago. The power of the reproductive equity movement stems from state- and community-based change.”
As the executive director of Reproductive Equity Now, a Massachusetts-based nonprofit that works to “make equitable access to all reproductive health care, including abortion care, a reality for all people,” Hart Holder is on the frontlines of the fight for reproductive freedom. And as a queer person, she’s uniquely positioned to understand the throughline from abortion access to LGBTQ+ rights.
“For me, the movement for LGBTQ+ liberation and the movement for reproductive equity are inextricably linked,” Hart Holder says. “It is not a coincidence that right after Texas banned abortion they went after trans kids. Anti-choice and anti-LGBTQ+ forces are fighting for the same thing: to control our bodies; to control if, when, and how we form families; and to control our right to determine our own future.”
In the wake of the leaked Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision that overturned Roe, Reproductive Equity Now, along with a broad coalition, shored up abortion access in Massachusetts through what she calls “visionary” legislation.
“Our law includes best-in-the-nation protections for providers of abortion and gender-affirming care, an expansion of access to medication abortion and emergency contraception, and the breakdown of serious cost barriers to abortion and abortion-related care,” she says. “We did this because we know a tidal wave is coming.”
Hart Holder, describes herself as, “mom to two little ones, wife, advocate, and amateur cook.”
“My purpose is simple: leave my square of the Earth in better shape than when I found it. I’ve known for a long time that I wanted to be a mom,” she says. “When my wife and I fell in love, we never imagined we would be able to get married but we always knew we would start a family. I am driven by a deep desire to make the world a better, safer, more just place for my kids.” @rhartholder