321ACTION: August 5, 2024
This week, we're focused on supporting a new bill that would strengthen existing workplace protections and another that will help stop child marriage, an issue which unfortunately persists in the United States and predominantly effects teenage girls, often causing irreparable damage.
We're also celebrating the anniversary of the only significant bipartisan gun violence prevention legislation in 30 years, and sharing an opportunity to learn more about the medical debt crisis from a federal agency.
Ready to make a difference?
Here are three ways to get started:
1.Show your Support for Workplace Protections
The BE HEARD in the Workplace Act, which would strengthen protections for employees, was reintroduced in the House on July 31.
This bill — the Bringing an End to Harassment by Enhancing Accountability and Rejecting Discrimination Act — would extend protections for all workers that reflect current understandings of sexual harassment, remove barriers to reporting and to justice, increase accountability for employers, and ensure better support for victims.
Click here to email your members of Congress and urge them to cosponsor this critical legislation.
2. Help Prevent Child Marriage
In the United States, between 2000 and 2018, more than 300,000 marriages involved a person under the age of 18.
Between 2007 and 2017, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services approved more than 8,500 marriage-based visa petitions involving at least one minor.
Girls who marry before the age of 18 experience an increased risk of domestic violence, have lower educational attainment and lower socioeconomic status, and experience worse physical and mental health.
Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL), Brian Schatz (D-HI), and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) have introduced the Child Marriage Prevention Act to reduce child marriage in the United States.
Click here to email your Senators and encourage them to co-sponsor the Child Marriage Prevention Act.
3. Help Stop the Medical Debt Crisis
15% of American households have medical debt, and 2 in 5 families with medical debt report having to choose between paying medical debt and paying for basic necessities such as food and housing.
Join a townhall meeting with Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Rohit Chopra on Aug. 8 from 12:30-1:30 p.m. ET for a chance to share concerns about medical debt, provide feedback about actions the CFPB can take to address medical debt, and learn about recent CFPB actions in this area.
Register here for the Aug. 8 webinar
+ In case you missed it...
June marked the two-year anniversary of the passage of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, the first significant firearms legislation signed into law in almost three decades.
JWI is engaged in ongoing discussions with the Administration to ensure BSCA’s provision narrowing the “dating loophole” are implemented in a way that reflects the real lived experiences of victims and survivors of dating violence.
JWI's Jewish Gun Violence Prevention Roundtable also helped people submit comments to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in order to clarify key terms in the Act.
Read a report from the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention about BSCA’s implementation here.