U.S. Women’s National Team stars Ashlyn Harris and Ali Krieger are calling for their male counterparts to get behind their push for equal pay.
The USWNT received class status on Nov. 8 in its gender discrimination lawsuit against the US Soccer Federation, which opens the door for any athlete who was a part of the women’s team national team camp or a game since Feb. 14, 2014, can now join the class-action suit.
But Harris and Krieger believe that in order for the equal pay fight to succeed, the members of the U.S. Men’s National Team need to be a part of the battle. In March, several of the men’s players spoke with Yahoo! Sports saying they support the women, and the USMNT players association released a statement in July which aimed to dispel a factsheet released by the U.S. Soccer Federation that claimed that the women have actually been paid more than the men.
“I think at the end of the day, we need men to step up, and we need these men to see our value and to see our worth and take a stance and say, ‘You know what? This is not okay. We need to make a change and our children need to make a change.’ And I think that is right now the (…) thing that’s missing,” Harris said, speaking to PowerPlays.news, which is a newsletter about sexism in sports which reporter Lindsay Gibbs launched in late October.
Mediation talks between US Soccer and the women broke down in August and a new trial date is set for May 2020, but Harris insists that she and the cause for equal pay needs, “boys and teenagers and adult men to really value and appreciate these women who are giving so much.”
