Hello, I'm Bonnie Erbe, Welcome to TDC extra.

Mexico is on track to have its first female president.

Claudia Sheinbaum, a former Mexico city mayor and she'll galvez a senator.

This follows another historic moment in mexico earlier this month when the Mexican Supreme Court ruled that any national laws banning abortion are unconstitutional and violate women's rights.

These steps appear to put Mexico ahead of the U.S. in terms of women in political power and women's control over their own bodies.

Erin, I remember for the show going to Mexico to do a story about how because of religious controls essentially over Mexican culture and many Mexican laws, that abortion was banned and there was a huge women were dying and with back alley abortions and all that sort of thing.

And now here we are 20 years later, and everything is has turned upside down.

So do you agree that this will put Mexico ahead of us in so many important women ways concerning women's rights?

Well, Mexico.

What you said is correct.

Mexico is already ahead of us, Right.

The U.S. is behind drastically on multiple fronts as far as it pertains to women's political representation, I mean, could it could it not be more clear when we've got two women running against each other in Mexico and then here in the United States, it's presumed that two very old white men are the two the two frontrunners for the presidency here.

So that's one contrast.

But then also, you know, the decriminalization of abortion in Mexico was terrifically exciting.

There still remains work to do at the local state laws within Mexico to make sure that laws catch up.

But it shows how behind the U.S. is right now.

And it's and we're indeed, Bonnie, it's not just Mexico.

You look around the world, the trend everywhere but the United States is liberalization of cruel and punitive and harsh abortion laws.

So three cheers to our sisters in Mexico who are leading the way.

And so much to learn from them and so grateful for their leadership and what they're showing us on self-managed abortion, which they led on and have been teaching people about in the United States.

And now we're going to continue watching them to see how to liberalize our laws.

All right, Hadley, I presume you see this as progress for Mexican women?

Well, it's questionable.

I don't know that there's a variety of metrics.

You know, as Erin points to, there's a variety of metrics that we can use to say how women are doing in any given culture or any given country.

I don't think that the metric of having gender parity in public office is necessarily the best metric.

American women have tremendous political power.

American women are actually a slight majority of the electorate.

So in terms of voting, I think both parties constantly are racking their brains about how to appeal to women voters and how to prioritize the interests of women voters given the different positions that the parties take.

But in terms of messaging, recruitment and trying to get women to vote and to run and participate in our civil discourse and in our political system, that's a priority across the board in the United States.

So I ask people, where in the world would you most like to be a woman?

And obviously, people will have different opinions about that.

But I don't think that the representation in public office, in terms of the percentage of Congress that's female or our lack of a female head of state necessarily paints the full picture of many of the rights that American women have enjoyed.

And many of the ways that the United States has led in terms of gender advancement and the advancement.

I think this election says a lot about Mexico, that women didn't even have the right to vote in Mexico until 1953.

And now the two major parties have women as nominated as nominees.

And it's interesting that both of them were scientists.

I think this tells us that Mexico is way ahead of the United States.

Oh, wait, we have we had I don't think we have a woman vice president and we don't now see her as necessarily becoming president.

So I think we all ought to look south to see what we can do to feminize American politics.

With respect, I disagree.

All right.

Thank you all so much for your important additions to this discussion.

That's it for TTC Extra.

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