TRENTON, NJ — Voters in New Jersey made their voices heard last night, voting to elect women’s health champions who will work to improve access to reproductive health care and fight back against attacks against our health and rights. As in New Jersey, voters across the country also followed suit, electing a pro-reproductive health majority to the House.

Senator Bob Menendez

Rep. Donald Norcross (NJ-1)

Rep. Josh Gottheimer (NJ-5)

Rep. Frank Pallone (NJ-6)

Tom Malinowski (NJ-7)

Rep. Albio Sires (NJ-8)

Rep. Bill Pascrell (NJ-9)

Rep. Donald Payne (NJ-10)

Mikie Sherrill (NJ-11)

Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (NJ-12)

“New Jersey voters just sent a clear message to politicians –– when you attack our health, rights, and freedoms, you lose your job,” said Triste Brooks of Planned Parenthood Action Fund of New Jersey. “Americans won’t stand idly by as politicians push for dangerous and unpopular policies that strip us of our health care and basic rights. These winning candidates put reproductive health care and rights in the center of their campaign, promising to protect access to health care for all people in New Jersey and across the country. And the voters heard them loud and clear.”

“Planned Parenthood Action Fund members in New Jersey knocked on thousands of doors and contacted thousands of people because we knew access to reproductive health care was on the line in this election,” said Roslyn Rogers Collins of Planned Parenthood Action Fund of New Jersey. “These midterm results sent a clear message: We expect politicians to listen to us, and fight to protect and expand access to reproductive health care. Planned Parenthood Action Fund of New Jersey stands ready to work with our newly elected leaders to expand access to reproductive health care in New Jersey.”

Make no mistake: it is the destructive policies coming out of the White House and Congress that fueled this victory, both in New Jersey and across the country. Over the past two years, we’ve seen the Trump-Pence administration and anti-women’s health Republican leadership in Congress try to eliminate access to health care and Planned Parenthood, ignore and mock survivors of sexual assault, attempt to erase the existence of transgender people, embrace racist and discriminatory policies, attack immigrant communities, and force through a Supreme Court justice who would gut Roe v. Wade and who had been accused of sexual assault. It is clear that access to reproductive health was on the line in the midterms. The American people have been pushed to a breaking point, and we’re seeing the results.

In response to these attacks, people fought back — marching in the streets, mobilizing their communities, and now, voting at the polls. Women’s rights are the number one issue driving people to take political action.