Project 2025 and the Fight for Women's and LGBTQI+ Rights

What happens when the government starts monitoring women's movements and potentially uses personhood laws to restrict travel? On this episode of the Love u Miss u Bye podcast, I, Christi Chanelle, invite you to explore the unsettling reality of Project 2025 and its profound implications on women's rights, LGBTQI+ rights, and environmental protections. As states like Texas and Idaho experiment with restrictive laws, my emotional turmoil mirrors the confusion many feel in today's political landscape. Together, let's unpack these issues, and the stalled progress of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), drawing unsettling parallels to dystopian tales like "The Handmaid's Tale." Amidst the chaos, it's crucial to stay informed, support equality-driven leaders, and advocate for constitutional protections.

This episode isn't just about political challenges; it's an invitation to reflect on broader questions and priorities. With Thanksgiving on the horizon, I urge us all to cherish freedom and equality, fostering unity and resistance in a politically charged climate. Whether you're deeply feeling the energy of these times or simply seeking to understand the emotions around you, join me as we navigate these turbulent waters and strive for a better, more inclusive future.

Chapters

• 0:00 Republican Plan to Restrict Women's Rights
• 16:05 The Fight for Equal Rights
• 24:22 Aliens in the Ocean

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Republicans' plan to restrict women from traveling freely around the United States has already begun. Now that we know that Project 2025 is indeed the plan, states have already begun enforcing and testing existing laws to monitor women, such as trafficking. The full faith and credit clause in the Constitution could be used to prevent travel from state to state if they declare a public health emergency. States like Texas, Tennessee, Idaho and Alabama have already tried using these laws, including giving personhood status to a fetus, so that the fetus inside you is a separate individual and therefore leaving the state would be trafficking.

Speaker 2: 0:39

It's always been about humanity. For me, it's always been about empowerment and lifting people up. I'm feeling lost and if that's something you don't want to hear and don't really feel connected to at the moment, I get it. I get it. We're all different and that's why I do this. Sometimes I'll be able to connect with certain people over here and sometimes I'll be able to connect with people over there, but either way, I hope you do stay and listen and maybe, if you don't feel like I feel, maybe you can understand how other people might be feeling.

Speaker 2: 1:37

I'm your host, christy Chanel, and this is the Love you Miss. You Bye podcast. This week has just been unbelievable. I mean, that's the best way I can describe it. It's. I feel like I'm almost living in an alternate universe. You know what I mean. You have to know what I mean. You know what I mean. You have to know what I mean.

Speaker 2: 2:08

All the things I knew to be true growing up are not Not even close to being true. My whole core has been shaken Deeply, deeply shaken. I'm trying to recover, just like I always have. It's a progression over time where you learn to heal yourself. The only problem is there's no time, because right when I start to feel better, it's going to get worse and I don't know how to deal with that. Like I don't see a way out of this and I think that's why I'm so terrified of it. I'm going back and forth between is this really happening or are my fears unfounded? But my intuition is screaming at me and one of the things I've always told you to do is to listen to your gut. It's there for a reason to protect you, and mine is screaming. Maybe yours is screaming too. Maybe yours is saying this girl is freaking insane. Hey, you have your right to feel that way, but I don't feel like it's that way.

Speaker 2: 3:33

I am grounded in optimism. That has always been my coping mechanism Optimism, love, positivity, change your negative mindset and maybe that's why I'm so rocked to the core, because that's who I am at my core and I can't find it right now. I can't find it. Right now I can't find it. And I see people just living their days and they're just posting their memes and they're talking about all these other things, and every time I see it I'm like how are you able to look and focus on anything else?

Speaker 2: 4:23

I feel energy. You know this, I say it on anything else. I feel energy. You know this. I say it on other episodes. I'm an energy feeler and I think that is why it took me out for days after the election I mean out, I couldn't focus on anything, nothing. I have just never felt that way before about an election, because Democrat or Republican, it doesn't matter Like it's a different political view and that's what this country is built on Different opinions, we don't have to be the same. That's what makes us great. But this time it just felt so much more urgent. It was so much more than that, and it just breaks my heart that people that I love do not get it.

Speaker 3: 5:32

Gop allies admitted that Project 2025 was a plan all along. Less than 24 hours after Trump's win was called, matt Walsh, a right-wing commentator, wrote on X. We can finally say that, yeah, actually Project 2025 is the agenda. But whether Walsh was trolling or not, stephen Miller, who was in a Project 2025 recruiting video, was just named Trump's chief of staff for policy. Since 2021, miller's been running the right-wing group America First Legal, the first of many organizations to formally back Project 2025. Trump also named Tom Homan a key contributor to Project 2025, as his borders are to carry out mass deportations. Trump had tried to distance himself from the unpopular 900 page scheme to rescue the country from the grip of the radical left, but we all knew it was his plan all along. The overlap in his proposals from project 2025 and his agenda 47, the myriad of Trump allies behind the document and the heritage foundation telling us Trump endorsed it in a secretly recorded video, gave it away.

Speaker 2: 6:23

He's very supportive of what we do.

Speaker 3: 6:24

It wasn't the left that got tricked. It was those who voted for Trump, believing they would never try to implement project 2025 and saying Democrats were just fear mongering. Just some of the documents contents include an unprecedented expansion of the president's power, a national abortion ban, doing away with environmental protections, erasing any protections for LGBTQI plus people, eliminating the department of education, rolling back benefits for veterans and so much more. Those on the left have been gearing up to fight the draconian plan, but a professor of public policy and political science at Northeastern University said there's a high probability a large portion of the plans get enacted if Republicans control the Senate and House. We're now in the f**k around and find out stage of American poli they don't get it.

Speaker 2: 7:03

Do you get it? I feel like I'm screaming into the void sometimes, but part of me knows no, all of me knows that somebody that listens to this possibly you are feeling this way and you want to feel seen, and I'm here to tell you that I see you. You're not alone. We're in this together, and I still don't know what it means for us, though, watching them say that they want to take down the Department of Education.

Speaker 4: 7:42

The Texas State Board of Education is going to be holding a vote on Monday on whether or not they're going to include Bible lessons in required English language arts curriculum. The curriculum that they are about to vote on is called Blue Bonnet Learning. It contains Bible references, bible lessons, scripture, christian ideology baked into the lessons. First, oklahoma is trying to put Trump Bibles in classrooms and force students to watch videos of the state superintendent praying a Christian prayer, and now the state of Texas is trying to integrate Bible lessons into English lessons. None of this is waiting to happen until after Trump takes office again.

Speaker 4: 8:19

Nothing legally has to change for them to start pulling this crap on us. Constitutionally, we are sitting in the same place that we were a few years ago, before they started trying to let Christian nationalism seep into our public schools. The only reason that they are able to do this is because one their constituents allow it. Like Texas and Oklahoma, the majority of these people think. People think it's a grand idea to bring prayer and the Bible back into schools, and the other reason that they know they can get away with it is because Trump is about to get into office and Project 2025 clearly spells out their plans for integrating Christian nationalism into our public schools. So they're just getting a head start.

Speaker 4: 9:01

But right now you do have options and if you want to make your testimony known to the State Board of Education before they hold a vote on it on Monday, please write your statement to testimony at sboctexasgov. And always remember, if they want to talk about parental rights and school choice, this game can be played both ways. You can exercise your parental rights and they do not have to force your child to pray or read the bible in public school. Make sure you tell your child what to do when that day comes. Make sure you clearly communicate your intent to campus admin so they know when your kid walks out of class.

Speaker 2: 9:38

That's exactly why the department of education is what helped my son, trevor. I moved to this area for education for him. He was struggling where we were, so I moved here and they diagnosed him right away as being dyslexic and ADD and having trouble taking tests and all of these things and he was approved and is a part of the 504 plan.

Speaker 5: 10:09

Do you know what happens if the Department of Education closes? Not what you think happens. Do you know what happens? Because the Department of Education is responsible for the IDEA Act of 1975 and that guarantees a free and appropriate education for all children with special needs. The Department of Education is closed. They are the only institution to enforce this, which means if you have a child with special needs, they are no longer guaranteed a free and appropriate education in this least restrictive environment, appropriate education in this least restrictive environment. It would be wise for you to ask questions to your school board, to your legislators in your state, to find out what their plan is to carry over the services and education of your child, if they have an IEP or 504 plan. Food for thought.

Speaker 2: 11:04

I'm a single mom. I would not have been able to afford that program on my own if I didn't have it. Now I'm lucky because we got in when he was in sixth grade and now he's a junior and because of that program my son has the confidence that I've always wanted him to have, because he didn't have it when we first moved here. He felt he was stupid. People were making fun of him because he couldn't read out loud like they could. It was a struggle for him. This program gave him the confidence to know that he was not stupid. I know if they remove him from the 504 plan, his senior year my son is going to be okay. I know that. But I sit here and I think about all those other kids that will not get those same opportunities because they're not going to be able to afford it. I am proof. The program worked. I'm sick.

Speaker 2: 12:16

You shouldn't force religion upon anyone. My mom ran from it. Christian Baptist from Texas, she wasn't allowed to wear shorts or bathing suits. She grew up in the church After she married my biological father, who was Catholic and Spanish, which was not a good thing, not by their standards. She ended up marrying my stepdad, a Jewish man, a teacher, and ran from Texas as fast as she could and decided she wasn't going to raise me in any religion and she was going to let me follow my heart and choose. And I appreciate that because that's the reason I am who I am, because I felt the freedom to follow my heart. It makes me a free thinker. This would have terrified her 100%. I'm sad, I'm worried, I'm scared. Texas introduced a few bills for 2025 legislation to review and pass or not pass, let's hope uncontested divorce.

Speaker 6: 13:20

They're coming for no fault divorce, and they're coming for it now. In Texas, a Republican has already filed for something that is called covenant marriage, a legal arrangement that has been favored by some conservative Christians. Under House Bill 931, both parties within a marriage would have to agree to a divorce in order for a court to grant it. Before that, they'd also have to undergo at least five hours of counseling by a member of the clergy or a licensed mental health professional.

Speaker 2: 13:46

Nobody should be able to tell you whether or not you can separate and legally divorce someone, but you, and I don't know why it's so difficult for people to see that I don't. I am so thrown off by the fact that these things, these fundamental rights, some people just don't care, and these same people think that they're going to keep all of theirs and they're not going to. It's a matter of time. But it only affects that group and not me. So we're good? No, we're not good. We're anything but good, and I think that's where my biggest struggle is. I'm struggling to understand that there's more hate than there is love, there's more division than there is unity, and that's hard to wake up to in the morning. And so you hold on to these little things that you may hear. You know, you hear that there's probably election fraud. You know how can all of this be decided in 24 hours? It's not typically decided in 24 hours. Elon Musk had an app that predicted, four hours before the winner was announced, that he knew Like. All of these things are red flags to me. But do we want to put ourselves in that headspace when it may not be true? We don't know if it's true, we don't, we think we suspect. But do we want to be the ones out there saying, oh, voter fraud, voter fraud. No. Do you remember how you felt about them when they did it? Like shut up, dude, get lost. Accept it. Be a bigger person than the way you're acting like a two-year-old toddler and accept it. I don't want that to be me. I choose that not to be me, so it won't be that to be me. I choose that not to be me, so it won't be. This is so messed up that there has to be a reason for it. Right, that's how we reconcile things in our mind. This means this, which has to be why it happened this way, because it doesn't make any sense any other way.

Speaker 2: 16:05

I do not think that everybody that voted for Trump is filled with hate Absolutely not. I know this not to be true. I believe it's because they don't know history. I believe it's because they may not be educated in the reasons that they voted for him, or they got caught up in the propaganda of Fox News and X, which was fueled and bought and run to brainwash. You Fight me on it. I posted a whole video series showing why that is. One of the things that I didn't know was that we are not women are not protected in the Constitution. Yet I thought we were. I thought we were. I am 51 years old and I thought we were protected in the Constitution.

Speaker 7: 17:02

Did you know that not everybody in America has guaranteed constitutional rights? Seems shocking, but it's actually true. It's come to my attention recently that many people are not familiar with the ERA, which is the Equal Rights Amendment. Now, this amendment would ensure that everyone has equal rights under the law, regardless of gender. It sounds straightforward, but surprisingly, it hasn't made it into our Constitution. The ERA was first introduced nearly a century ago, in 1923, by Alice Paul, who was a leader in fighting for the right to vote for women. In the 1970s it gained strong support, but it fell a few states short by the time of the ratification deadline hit in 1982. Recently, more states have passed the ERA, technically giving it enough support, but there's a lot of legal debate whether or not these newer votes can count, given the deadline. Some people wonder why we even need the ERA when we already have laws like the Equal Rights Act. And here's the difference While the Equal Rights Act does provide protections, it's a law. It's not an amendment, and that means it could be changed or even taken away by Congress. The ERA, on the other hand, would be a part of the Constitution, providing a permanent, unchangeable guarantee of equal rights.

Speaker 7: 18:24

Now, if you're wondering what we can do to help the ERA finally make it to the Constitution. Here's some ways to start. Number one stay informed. Knowledge is power. Share the story of the ERA with others. The more we understand its importance, the stronger the movement becomes. Two support leaders who are committed to equality. Some lawmakers are actively working to have the ERA recognized, and supporting these leaders can make a difference.

Speaker 7: 18:54

And number three reach out to your voters. Your voice matters. A quick email call or even a message on social media can help show that people still care about the ERA and that it is not a dead issue. Four get involved in advocacy groups. Organizations like the ERA Coalition or the League of Women Voters are leading the charge, holding events, rallies and petitions, and getting involved can amplify your impact. Number five vote for candidates who champion the ERA. Voting is one of the most powerful tools we have to push issues like this further. The ERA is still within our reach and with all of us raising awareness and supporting change, we can finally secure equal rights for all as a permanent part of our Constitution. And wouldn't that be great if we all had guaranteed constitutional rights. We need the ERA now.

Speaker 2: 19:54

I've been asleep for a long freaking time and I can't go back to sleep. I can't go back to sleep. We are not freaking. Protected in the constitution, like that's a freaking big deal and Trump is about to take over. That sends anxiety through my entire body. Equal pay that sends anxiety through my entire body. Equal pay Not protected. Rights over our body Not protected. And why? What's the holdup? It sounds pretty open and shut to me. Get it in the Constitution. They've already approved it. What are we waiting on? What is to be talked about? Why do we have to write letters to Biden to get him to do it? What are we waiting on? What is to be talked about? Why do we have to write letters to Biden to get him to do it? Fucking, do it. These are the things that keep me up at night. These are the reasons I can't do true crime right now, because I'm living in a true nightmare.

Speaker 2: 20:53

I attempted to watch Handmaid's Tale again. I got through about 30 minutes and I was like I can't watch this anymore. And you know I've watched it before. I never got to the end. I never saw the end, but I've watched it before and I enjoyed it because it seemed like it was fiction. When I turned it on this time I panicked because it wasn't fiction any longer.

Speaker 2: 21:20

Am I alone in this? I have to know, am I crazy? I talked to my best friend and I said can you talk like right now? This was a few days ago Can you talk right now? And she's like yeah. So we talked and I am just crying to her and I said I just needed to touch grass. You've always been my center point. You've always you've made me steady. You kept me steady. And I said am I crazy for being scared? Am I crazy for feeling like the world is forever about to change, that we may not be safe? And she said I wasn't and it validated all the things I have been feeling. I believe her. I'm just trying to understand it and this is kind of like my video diary. Maybe nobody wants to listen to it, and that's okay and it's for me, because what happens next will forever change us. It just will.

Speaker 2: 22:28

I am a free thinker. I don't want to be put in a category. I don't want to be put in a category for religion. I don't want to be put in a category for politics. I don't want to be put in a category for politics. I just want to do what I want to do Honestly. I mean, if you want to label me, you can absolutely do that, but I don't label myself, I just don't, and I'm not about to start now, so I'm gonna fucking wear red. I have so many things going in my head I can't even keep my thoughts straight.

Speaker 2: 23:00

The people that Trump has discussed appointing to these high ranking positions make me physically ill. One is a white supremacist. One is a Fox host. I think he's taken over the Department of Defense. I guess there's a court case going on on one of them, trafficking, or I don't know, sexual assaults. They want to release it. We'll see. I'm not going to name names in this podcast. I don't care. That is not my point. My point is that this is all for a reason and I'm trying to figure it out Besides the obvious and take. You know he also wants to. You know, remove high ranking generals and stuff from our military.

Speaker 2: 23:48

If they don't believe, if they're part of the woke community, what's so bad about woke anyway? I want to know, because I don't get it Like, yeah, if you're woke, good for you man. Like congratulations, you're not part of the sheep. I like that. I don't care if you call me woke I don't, because I'm woke as hell right now. I just said I was sleeping before, it was a nice, peaceful sleep, but now I'm woke. But my favorite, my favorite.

Speaker 2: 24:22

I was actually at work, focused, and all of a sudden I hear the aliens live in the ocean. Like I can handle one more freaking thing right now. Like you know, that's like kicking me when I'm down, what you know. I have a kicking me when I'm down, what you know. I have a problem with this whole thing. Do I think there's aliens? I do, I really, really do. I don't know what this whole thing is about. Let's release a little bit. Problem is they're not showing us any pictures or giving us any real, real information, so we still don't have anything. I mean, it makes sense that they live in the ocean and it makes sense that I'm not going in the ocean ever again. I'd like a little bit more information, please, if you will, and then I'll think about it. My brain is just having some struggles right now. I'm going to need some time, so just hang on for a little while. I'm still figuring. Need some time, so just hang on for a little while. I'm still figuring out my direction. That's why I never really truly picked a niche for my channel, because I can't stay in one box.

Speaker 2: 25:25

I talk from the heart, I talk about things that are fueling my passion for that time frame, and right now it's this. I'm getting educated, I will be sharing stuff with you. I think it's important we talk about it. As an energy feeler, this doesn't feel good. Is your intuition screaming at you or do you feel nothing? Does the energy feel good to you? I mean, I'm not the same person. I'm just not. Thanksgiving is upon us. I'm going to watch some documentaries, I'm going to think about some new subjects and I'm going to try to speak out. This is our lives we're talking about. This is our freedoms we're talking about and I think it trumps forgive the pun everything else in our lives. Nothing is more important than equality for all of us, and we are the resistance. Love you, miss you, bye.