Hope Solo: I Won't Settle for Anything Less than Equal Pay for Women
Hope Solo is fed up.
The Olympic gold medalist and soccer star was suspended from her job as goalkeeper for the U.S. Soccer national team after making controversial remarks following her team’s defeat at the 2016 Rio Olympics last year. She has been engaged in a lawsuit over gender pay discrimination since April 2016. And just last week she named Sepp Blatter, former head of FIFA, soccer’s international governing organization, as a sexual harasser, alleging that he groped her at a 2013 awards ceremony (a claim Blatter denies).
Speaking at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Next Gen Summit in Laguna Niguel, Calif., Solo said that she expects a ruling or settlement to be reached “any day now” regarding the lawsuit she filed with four other teammates over unfair pay last year. “I don’t intend to settle for anything short of what is equal,” she told the audience at the Monarch Beach Resort.
“When you file for equal pay, you don’t want to settle anything less because this is law. This is American law,” Solo said, citing the Equal Pay Act of 1963, which renders wage disparities based on sexual discrimination illegal.
“It was passed 60 years ago, but who is going to enforce it?” Solo said. “We have to enforce it ourselves.”
During the interview, Solo reaffirmed her belief that she was suspended from her job for being “one of the loudest voices to fight for equal pay.” The decorated athlete acknowledged: “I was a thorn in my employer’s side for about 20 years.”
“You can’t just ask nicely for somebody to give up power,” Solo added. “You have to take it.”
Even if it’s an ugly fight, she added to a chorus of applause, “you have to take what is rightfully yours.”
This article originally appeared on Fortune.com.
