FFS Friday: Amie Ichikawa from Woman II Woman

July 12, 2024

FFS (Female Free Speech) Friday honors women and girls who are speaking out about the harms that “gender identity” poses to women and girls as a sex class. FFS Friday posts are free and shareable. If you would like access to content that delves deeper into the movement to protect the sex-based rights of women and girls and to stop the abolition of sex, please consider a paid subscription.

Today’s FFS Friday honors Amie Ichikawa, founder of the group Woman II Woman, which advocates on behalf of incarcerated women.

Yesterday, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted NO on President Biden’s nomination of magistrate judge Sarah Netburn to a lifetime seat on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. 

During her May 2024 confirmation hearing, Netburn was asked about her decision to permit, over the objection of the US Bureau of Prisons, a man to be housed in a federal women’s prison. The man, William McClain (who goes by the name July Justine Shelby), had previously been convicted of two counts of child rape and one count of distributing child pornography while on parole. In her ruling permitting his transfer, Netburn said that any concerns that housing McClain in the women’s prison would be traumatizing to incarcerated women were “overblown.” During the hearing, Netburn said that McClain is “entirely a female,” but when challenged, said she meant to say that he is “hormonally a female.” Then she confirmed that he has male genitalia. We now know, thanks to the Washington Free Beacon, that McClain has been caught exposing himself to female inmates in the federal prison where he’s been housed since Netburn ordered his transfer.

One member of the Senate Judiciary Committee to vote no was Jon Ossoff, a Democratic Senator from Georgia. This is the first time a Democrat has voted no on one of President Biden’s judicial nominations. In my view, credit for this development goes to Amie Ichikawa.

From her bio:

Amie Ichikawa was incarcerated at the Central California Women’s Facility in Chowchilla for five years. She realized there is a major lack of re-entry services for women and limited accessibility to those available services upon release. She is one of the founding members of womaniiwoman, whose goal is to empower incarcerated women to stand up for themselves and become actively involved in campaigning for their own freedom. 

In his ten-minute speech opposing Netburn’s nomination (all of which is worth watching), Senator Ted Cruz said, “Given the avalanche of letters this Committee has received from women’s groups and female inmates, I’m not the only person with concerns.” Many of those letters came from Amie and the incarcerated women she works with. 

Incidentally, I love the fact that in his speech, Cruz said, “At 51 years of age, Shelby decided that he’s a woman.” That’s TERF language and I’m thrilled to see it being said out loud in the halls of Congress. (I don’t like a lot of the other language he used, including “transgender prisoner” (he means a man) and “biological man” (there is no other kind of man), but this is not the time to quarrel about that.)

At just after 5:25 in his speech, he returned to the topic of the letters the Committee received from female inmates, “horrified at the prospect of being housed with a biological male, fearing, quite reasonably, for their safety.” He then went on to read some of the letters, including one from “Amie I, a former inmate.” That’s Amie Ichikawa. He then read her letter: 

I urge the Committee to watch my story and the stories of other female prisoners and a brave resigned lieutenant who spoke out against this anti-woman policy. Women, including incarcerated women, shouldn’t be erased as a matter of law to accommodate the interests of men. One person’s rights cannot come at the cost of another’s.  

He then read a few more letters from female inmates and former female inmates. Amie is responsible for organizing this letter-writing campaign.

Senator Mike Lee’s six and a half minute speech is worth watching as well. At 2:50 into the speech, he mentioned Amie by name, using her full name. Senator Lee went on to read Amie’s letter as well as that of Alissa Kamholz, a rape survivor whose step-father was a Hell’s Angel. For ten years, she was raped repeatedly by him and his “biker buddies.” Alissa once gave an interview to the group Independent Women’s Forum (IWF) for their film Cruel & Unusual Punishment about this topic, which I wrote about in a previous FFS Friday. Again, Amie organized this letter-writing campaign.

When I texted Amie to congratulate her and express my shock that Ossoff had voted no to confirm, she replied, “I sent a very serious and heartfelt email to his legal analyst last night [the night before the vote].” 

Without her fierce determination, the voices of these women most likely never would have been heard in the halls of the U.S. Senate and there’s a very good chance Netburn would have been confirmed. Instead, a majority of the Senate Judiciary Committee (including one Democrat) did the right thing and voted no.

Amie, today’s FFS Friday is for you.