Breastfeeding mamas: This new law is going to make traveling SO much easier 🙌

I’m so proud my bipartisan FAM Act was signed into law. This long-awaited law will help improve children’s health a… https://t.co/MFl1v2VBeJ

— Tammy Duckworth (@SenDuckworth) 1539104355.0

Duckworth has long been advocating for this, and has a lot of personal experience pumping in less-than-ideal airport locations. In September 2017 she penned an op-ed for Cosmopolitan , explaining how as a working mom who frequently flies back and forth between Illinois and DC, finding places to pump at the airport was way more difficult than it should have been. “I had to stick to a feeding and expressing schedule, including when I was at the airport, but I quickly realized that finding a clean, accessible, private space was stressful and inordinately difficult. While I was comfortable breastfeeding my daughter in public, I did not want to express next to strangers using the same outlets to recharge their electronic devices. At many airports, I was redirected to a bathroom, forced to pump in a bathroom stall.”

Thanks to the FAM Act, airports will be able to access grants to create pumping rooms. The airports will also be required to put changing tables in the women’s ( and men’s! ) bathrooms. Parents should absolutely be able to change their baby in airport lavatories, and they absolutely should not have to use those facilities when pumping or breastfeeding. Lactation rooms are not a luxury, they’re a necessity in public spaces, and it’s awesome that the FAM Act recognizes that. As Senator Duckworth once put it: “If a mother chooses to breastfeed their child, she should not have to worry about whether she can find a clean, private place to nurse or express breast milk while she’s traveling; she has enough to worry about already.” Every parent who has ever traveled with a baby, a pump, or both can agree with that statement.