CONCORD, NH – Cecile Richards, a national leader for abortion access and women’s rights who led Planned Parenthood for 12 tumultuous years, has died. She was 67.
Richards died Monday at home “surrounded by family and her faithful dog, Ollie,” her family said in a statement.
“Our hearts are broken today, but no words can do justice to the joy she brought to our lives,” the family said.
Richards, the daughter of the late Texas Governor Ann Richards, was diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, in 2023, five years later. she left Planned Parenthood.
Although Planned Parenthood also offers contraception, cancer screenings and testing for sexually transmitted diseases at clinics across the country, its status as the nation’s largest abortion provider has long made it a target of social conservatives. Under Richards’ leadership, the organization gained membership, donor support, and political power, and played a prominent role in pushing back on critics.
In 2015, she spent hours answer hostile questions of Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives who later established an investigative panel to investigate Planned Parenthood’s abortion and fetal tissue policies. In 2021, she warned that the U.S. Supreme Court’s inaction on Texas’ restrictive abortion law could mean the end of judicial checks and balances in this area. And after the court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, she continued to speak out.
“One day our children and grandchildren may ask us, ‘What did you do when it was all on the line?’” she said at the Democratic National Convention in August. “The only acceptable answer is: ‘Everything we could.’”
Born July 15, 1957 in Waco, Texas, Richards earned a bachelor’s degree in history from Brown University, where she unfurled a banner from a second-floor window during her 1980 graduation ceremony to protest the school’s investments in South Africa.
“One of the most popular buttons of the day was ‘Question Authority,’ and I feel like we did that every day, and it definitely set me on my path,” she said in a 2017 speech to graduates. “Brown instilled in me the belief that each of us can change the world and that this is in fact what is expected of us.”
After college, she worked as an organizer for low-wage workers in several states before returning to Texas to help with her mother’s gubernatorial campaign in 1990. In 2004, she founded America Votes, and before joining Planned Parenthood, she was a deputy chief of staff to Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader of the House of Representatives.
“It has been my privilege to work directly with Cecile for many years and I have a front-row seat to her sharp intellect, strategic thinking and ruthless effectiveness,” Pelosi said in a statement Monday. “As she ascended to other leadership roles, we never stopped working together to defend the rights of women and working families.”
Outgoing President Joe Biden, who awarded Richards the Presidential Medal of Freedom in November, on Monday called her a “leader of the greatest character.”
“Cecile has fearlessly led us forward to be the America we say we are,” he said in a statement. “She carried her mother’s torch for justice and championed some of our country’s most important civil rights cases. She fought for the dignity of workers, defended and advanced women’s reproductive rights and equality, and mobilized our fellow Americans to exercise their right to vote.”
After leaving Planned Parenthood, Richards was co-chairman of American Bridge, which supports liberal causes and conducts opposition research on Republicans. Last fall, she launched a project using social media to highlight personal stories about the impact of abortion bans and restrictions.
Alexis McGill Johnson, current president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, called Richards an “indomitable force.”
“As we continue to navigate uncharted territory, we will be able to overcome the challenges we face, thanks in large part to the movement that Cecile has built over the decades,” she said. “I know without a doubt that Cecile would tell us that the best way to honor her memory is to put on arms – preferably in pink – and fight like hell for Planned Parenthood patients across the country.”
Richards is survived by her husband, two daughters, a son and a grandson.
In her speech at the Democratic Convention, Richards described the joy of becoming a grandmother in 2023 and called Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign a “celebration of women.”
“As my mother, Governor Ann Richards, would say, ‘I hear America singing,’” she said. “When women have the freedom to make their own decisions about their lives and follow our dreams, we will be unstoppable.”
– Holly Ramer