It's the Brian Laird Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. There is potentially really

big news this morning from Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, who will be on the show later

this hour. Gillibrand and Congressman Cory Busch of Missouri have you heard this yet?

Are introducing a resolution to declare the Equal Rights Amendment has been ratified

and officially should become the 28th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The ERA, which

bans discrimination on the basis of sex, passed Congress long ago and was ratified by

enough states to become law, but it depends on your interpretation whether the final states

ratified it in time to count. Gillibrand's resolution would declare that yes it did.

Now part of the hope here, as I understand it, is that that would provide a new constitutional

basis for restoring abortion rights nationally or politically Republican senators running

for re-election next year will be on the record as voting no, if they vote no, for equal

rights for women. The New York Times today cites a recent Pew Research Center poll done

in 2020, which found the concept of an ERA has overwhelming public support around 80%.

So go ahead, Republicans vote against this at your peril is basically the dare here from

Senator Gillibrand. This is being introduced officially this afternoon is what I'm told

and Senator Gillibrand will join us to reveal it to you first right here in about a half

hour. We will also talk to her at that time about a bill she's introducing after this

week's flood rains knocked out all that Metro North and Amtrak train service. Apparently,

when Congress passed the bipartisan infrastructure bill, they included funding to make highways

more resilient to climate related flooding, but not mass transit. So Gillibrand has a

Resilient Transit Act. It's another challenge for some Republicans who will vote for automobile

infrastructure, but mass transit not so much. You know some of this history, we've talked

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