Thank you for listening to and sharing our body politic.

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Thanks so much. This is our body politic.

I'm the creator and host Fari Chidea.

This week we take a look back at the best segments we aired this year.

A lot happened in 2021. Oh my goodness.

And we are going to take stock of the joy and growth we experienced. We're also going to

highlight the work of black women and all women of color improving our lives.

Lauren Underwood is a U.S. representative from Illinois. Back in April, we talked to her about the bill she introduced in Congress at the beginning of the year. It's called the monobinbus and it tackles maternal health and mortality rates of birthing persons in black and other underserved populations. We already know that maternal mortality rates in the U.S. are the worst of any developed country,

and that black women are three times more likely to die from pregnancy-related complications than white women.

Representative Underwood has extensive experience in this field,

having been a registered nurse, worked at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,

all before being elected to the House in 2018.

She's making this a core issue she wants to work on.

We talked to Lauren Underwood earlier this year.

Representative Underwood, welcome.

Thank you. Hi, Fry. I'm so glad to be with you.

I am really glad to be with you.

And you really have such an extraordinary

background to bring to lawmaking. Start off by telling us about your work in the Black

...