How to Join & File the Discrimination Lawsuit in your State or Country

And: Uniting for the Power to Win!

We got a great response following the filing of our discrimination lawsuit on Tuesday—virtually all very positive!

Tons of mothers and advocates have contacted The Women’s Coalition this week asking how to file a similar lawsuit in their own state or country, so this post is the response for all.

NOTE: The Wednesday WCN&V article includes a link to download the lawsuit to a pdf file. If you prefer to just view (not download) it, here is a link that opens in your browser: https://bit.ly/WCdiscriminationlawsuit.

Please share this post with anyone interested in filing the lawsuit or spreading the word with MSM, independent, or social media.

First, to be clear, these lawsuits are not an end in and of themselves. Hopefully they will help women who have active cases, but there is no guarantee.

They serve to legally and culturally establish that discrimination is the cause of women losing custody and are meant to be a springboard for demanding the implementation of a new system where judges do not have the power to discriminate.

WHERE TO FILE

In the U.S., the lawsuit must be filed state by state, as child custody is always under state jurisdiction.

In other countries, custody may be under state or federal jurisdiction, so check with an attorney.

Our Coalition has mothers in every state and country who have expressed interest in joining a lawsuit. So we have a base of women from which to file just about anywhere.

WHAT TO DO

If you're interested in joining a discrimination against women in family court lawsuit, please fill out one of these forms:

NEW YORK: https://bit.ly/NYComplaintForm

OTHER U.S. STATES: https://bit.ly/WClawsuitform

OTHER COUNTRIES: https://bit.ly/WCintllawsuit

In order to file anywhere, we need a (preferably) female attorney who will file the Complaint pro bono. So please ask around.

If you find an attorney who is willing to file pro bono, have her contact Cindy Dumas (Women’s Coalition’s Executive Director) at cindydumas@womenscoalition.org. We will work together to ensure the lawsuit stays true to purpose.

It is important to file with The Women’s Coalition, as many lawsuits give us power to deter dismissals and win.

The Coalition overseeing the suits ensures it remains substantively unchanged: a true discrimination lawsuit. It must not be confused with parents’ rights, gender-neutral, DV/child abuse, or general violations of due process claims—or or anything else.

EQUAL PROTECTION CLAIM

Our lawsuit is exclusively about women’s right to not be discriminated against in child custody cases. This translates legally into the right to “equal protection of the laws”.

The right to not be discriminated against based on sex is guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, so we can file suits in all states under the 14th Amendment.

Twenty-eight states provide a type of “equal rights amendment” that explicitly prohibits the denial or abridgment of rights on the basis of sex, including the right to equal protection of the laws.

In those states, we may file under both constitutional and state law, as we did in the New York suit. Check here to see if your state is on the list.

Many western countries provide this equal protection right for women in some form.

Check with a civil rights attorney in your country to find out if the law includes equal protection of the laws for sex and it may be applied to child custody cases. This is necessary to file a discrimination lawsuit.

This substantive claim cannot be altered or it changes the whole idea of the lawsuit—to establish the core cause of the Custody Crisis as discrimination so we can attack that root cause to end it. Some attorneys and advocates may want to revise the suit, but the only changes should be to adapt the suit procedurally to each state/country.

A myriad of due process violations, some listed in the lawsuit from “a” to “p”, are merely a result of the discrimination. In other words, women’s right to due process (a fair and impartial process) is being violated because they are women.

UNITING FOR POWER

The goal of our Coalition of Women is to unite under a shared set of facts about the Custody Crisis so we have the power to end it. There is power in numbers!

It is vital to ending the Custody Crisis that we stick together as women, so we have the power to replace false cultural narratives, win discrimination lawsuits, and pass legislation for a new child custody code that will end it.

Until now, women have been divided under false impressions the Crisis is being caused by various other things and think the ineffective solutions being proposed will end it.

It is important to file these lawsuits together, as women, as a class, under one umbrella. There is power in numbers—and that is what the Coalition is for—uniting women nationally and internationally so we are a force to be reckoned with!

You are strongly encouraged to speak out to everyone everywhere about this historic filing of the lawsuit and the establishment of gender discrimination as the cause of you losing custody and/or being unable to protect your children. Make sure and ask them to join us at the Coalition. Go forth and multiply!

If you speak to the media or are invited on a podcast to talk about the lawsuit, please ask the journalist/reporter/host to speak with Executive Director Cindy Dumas, so there is not misinformation accidentally disseminated about either the lawsuit or the Custody Crisis: cindydumas@womenscoalition.org.

So, mamas, let’s all come together under The Women’s Coalition umbrella so we can stop courts from taking and harming our children!

You can join us through our contact form, our substack, and/or Sisters in Solidarity, our activism group. [Be sure and check alternate inboxes and spam.]

IN SOLIDARITY!!

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Or feel free to support the Coalition’s work through a one-time or recurring contribution through our Paypal Giving Fund.

All contributions are greatly appreciated!