Equal Pay Day chance for Dems to court women voters

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama and other Democrats on Tuesday seized on Equal Pay Day — a symbolic event dramatizing how much longer it takes a woman to earn as much as a man — to court women voters and call out Republicans for inaction on the issue.

Obama dedicated a new national monument to women’s equality and pushed Congress to pass legislation. He suggested he’s encouraged by movement toward full gender equality in many arenas — including corporate boardrooms, professional sports and presidential politics.

“If we truly value fairness, then America should be a level playing field,” the president said as he joined House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, Maryland Democratic Sen. Barbara Mikulski and other Democrats at the Sewall-Belmont House and Museum in D.C., the onetime home of the National Women’s Party now designated as Belmont-Paul Women’s Equality National Monument. Alva Belmont and Alice Paul were figures in the women’s rights and suffrage movements.

The Democrats’ focus on Equal Pay comes amid a presidential campaign where the Republican front-runner, Donald Trump, has alienated female voters in droves, leading to GOP fears he could diminish the party’s standing with that key constituency for years to come. While Obama and Democratic lawmakers trumpet their equal pay proposals at news conferences, Republicans have little to offer in return.

“We feel we shouldn’t be playing identity politics, we should be working together to strengthen families,” said Sarah Chamberlain, president of the Republican Main Street Partnership, which advocates for pragmatic, center-right policies.

Democrats support legislation requiring employers to show pay disparity is not based on gender, among other steps. The bill, which passed the House when it was under Democratic control but was blocked by Senate Republicans, builds on the first law Obama signed as president, the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, aimed at making it easier for women to sue over wage discrimination.

For their part, the Republicans who control the House and Senate have announced no plans to act on legislation addressing pay inequity, even though a few GOP lawmakers are pushing bills on the issue.

Obama said he hoped visitors to the museum will someday be astonished that there was ever a time when women could not vote.

“I want them to be astonished that there was ever a time when women earned less than men for doing the same work. I want them to be astonished that there was ever a time when women were vastly outnumbered in the boardroom or in Congress, or there was ever a time when a woman had never sat in the Oval Office,” he said. “I don’t know how long it will take to get there, but I know we’re getting closer to that day.”