During her last debate performance, whatever attention Williamson got was attributed to her, uh, eccentric answers on serious political matters. (At one point, she referred to New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern as “girlfriend.”) However, her second appearance won her some actual, legitimate praise. Last night she referred to Trump as a “dark psychic force.” She also made a cogent, passionate argument for reparations in black communities for the crimes of slavery. Slatecalled Williamson’s take “the clearest—and best—answer” on the topic.
“Well, first of all, it’s not $500 billion in financial assistance. It’s a $200 to $500 billion payment of a debt that is owed,” she began in her response last night. Then she launched into some of the numbers behind “the economic gap between blacks and whites in America” that comes “from a great injustice that has never been dealt with.”
“That great injustice has to do with the fact there were 250 years of slavery followed by another 100 years of domestic terrorism. What makes me qualified to say $200 to $500 billion? I’ll tell you what makes me qualified. If you did the math of the 40 acres and a mule, given that there were 4 to 5 million slaves at the end of the Civil War—they were all promised 40 acres and a mule for a family of four. If you did the math today, it would be trillions of dollars. And I believe that anything less than $100 billion is an insult, and I believe that $200 to $500 billion is politically feasible today, because so many Americans realize there is an injustice that continues to form a toxicity underneath the surface,” she said.
Online, people applauded her directness. By Wednesday morning, media reported that she had been the most-searched candidate during the broadcast. Memes piled up on Twitter, casting her as a peaceful left-field force. Others simply pointed out that she had a good showing.
“Marianne Williamson & Beto for Reparations. She gets another huge applause. I know people might not like hearing it, but Williamson is having a good night. Doesn’t mean she’s a good candidate, just saying she’s having good night. She seems comfortable and confident,” one person tweeted.
However, despite her performance, some social media users urged new fans to take note of Williamson’s damaging comments in the past about vaccines and mental health. (She once said antidepressants were overprescribed for issues of “normal human despair” and backtracked after “misspeaking” about what she had said were “draconian” vaccines.)
Last night (June 27), the second group of Democratic presidential candidates—including Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Kirsten Gillibrand, Bernie Sanders, and Pete Buttigieg—took the stage to debate issues like immigration, health care, and climate change.
But it was a tense exchange about race between Harris and Biden that has everyone talking, both online and off. Harris brought up the subject of race and talked generally about the fact that discrimination is still very much an issue in the U.S. before directing her comments at the former vice president.
“I do not believe you are a racist and I agree with you when you commit yourself to the importance of finding common ground. But I also believe — and it’s personal and it was hurtful to hear you talk about the reputations of two United States senators who built their reputations and career on the segregation of race in this country,” she said. “It was not only that, but you also worked with them to oppose busing. There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools, and she was bused to school every day. That little girl was me. So I will tell you that on this subject, it cannot be an intellectual debate among Democrats. We have to take it seriously. We have to act swiftly.”
She was referring to controversial comments Biden made earlier this month where he talked about his abilities to get things done with people across the aisle during a bygone time of “civility,” mentioning two notable segregationist senators, James Eastland and Herman Talmadge. During his time as a senator, Biden also opposed a federal mandate on busing as a means of integrating public schools.
Biden looked visibly shocked to hear Harris reference herself as a young student who was bussed to school and went on to respond to her other claims. “It’s a mischaracterization of my position across the board. I did not praise racists. The fact is that, in terms of busing, the busing, I never — you would have been able to go to school the same exact way because it was a local decision made by your city council,” he said.
He reiterated his record on other matters related to civil rights and commented on his choice to become a public defender, not a prosecutor like Harris, before shutting down his own argument due to time. “I supported the ERA from the very beginning. I’m the guy that extended the Voting Rights Act for 25 years … I’ve also argued very strongly that we, in fact, deal with the notion of denying people access to the ballot box. I agree that everybody, once they, in fact — anyway, my time is up. I’m sorry.”
Miley Cyrus gave a much needed update to the holiday classic “Santa Baby” during her appearance on The Tonight Show Thursday evening, December 20. The pop singer performed a more progressive version of the 1953 song, which has lyrics like “I want a yacht and really that’s not a lot” and “Slip a sable under the tree for me.” (A sable, for those who don’t know, is a fur.)
“Am I saying I’m gonna hook up with Santa if he buys me all this stuff?” Cyrus says in the sketch right before she starts singing. “I’m asking for a car and a yacht and checks and literally the deed to a platinum mine. What?”
Her revised version, though, is much more empowered. Miley doesn’t need Santa to buy her these things because she makes her own money! “Don’t want diamonds, cash, or stuff,” she sings midway through her version. “Nothing that comes in a box. No more fluff. I’ve had enough. And I can buy my own damn stuff.”
She also adds in some lyrics about the #MeToo and Time’s Up movements. “A girl’s best friend is equal pay,” she says, before addressing workplace harassment. “Santa Baby, I’d love to know my ass won’t get grabbed at work by some ignorant jerk.”
These are lyrics we can get behind. Watch Cyrus perform her version of “Santa Baby” for yourself, below.
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This song is one of a few holiday tunes our culture is revisiting from a post-MeToo lens. Another example is “Baby It’s Cold Outside,” which is about a man who tries to stop a woman from leaving his house even though it seems that she wants to.
When it comes to the controversial nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, men run the show.
Technically, anyway.
President Donald Trump, of course, picked Kavanaugh for the high court. The Senate Judiciary Committee, which has held confirmation hearings on the judge—including testimony from Christine Blasey Ford, who has accused him of sexually assaulting her in the 1980s—is controlled by Republican Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley. And the Senate majority leader is Kentucky Republican Mitch McConnell, who’s firmly on Kavanaugh’s side and is driving the chamber toward confirmation as fast as he can.
But a group of women are playing pivotal roles at this divisive moment in U.S. history. Some serve on the Judiciary Committee. Some have staked out positions as nationally recognized champions of women’s rights. Some face a choice between siding with their party or with those protesting it.
Here, in alphabetical order, is a quick guide to some of the Senate women who’ve been in the spotlight (or on the hot seat) in the Kavanaugh controversy, including those whose political futures are definitely worth watching in the run-up to the 2020 race for president.
SUSAN COLLINS
PHOTO: Bloomberg
The GOP controls the Senate by a tiny margin, so any defections put the party in danger of seeing Kavanaugh’s confirmation blow up. Collins, who represents Maine, has been one of the most closely tracked members of the Senate throughout the Kavanaugh debate: She’s a Republican, but she’s also pro-choice.
Before Ford’s claims that Kavanaugh attacked her when they were high school students—which he has categorically denied—Collins was already regularly swarmed by reporters trying to take her temperature on whether she’d vote to confirm the judge to replace the retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy. Now she’s surrounded not only by the press, but under pressure from both protesters and colleagues who want her to reject Kavanaugh.
Collins supported Trump’s first SCOTUS nominee last year, but that was a very different story: When Neil Gorsuch succeeded the late Justice Antonin Scalia, it was a matter of one conservative replacing another. The balance of the court was unchanged. Kennedy was also nominated by a Republican president, Ronald Reagan, but he ended up a swing justice who sided with liberals in critical cases that upheld abortion protections. Replacing Kennedy with Kavanaugh would tilt the high court firmly to the right.
Collins met privately with Kavanaugh before the Ford allegations. She said that she came away with the understanding that the judge considers Roe v. Wade a matter of settled law.
But since Kavanaugh went on the defensive over the assault claims, Collins has come under even more pressure to take a side. She publicly called the allegations “serious” and supported allowing lawyers for Ford and Kavanaugh to question each other during the Judiciary hearings (which didn’t end up happening).
As of Thursday, she had told reporters she considered the FBI probe “very thorough,” but said she hadn’t finished reviewing all the materials. She also hadn’t said how she planned to vote.
DIANNE FEINSTEIN
PHOTO: Bloomberg
The California senator is in a challenging position: She’s the highest-ranking woman on the Judiciary Committee, but she’s a Democrat. (As the majority party, Republicans ultimately control the proceedings.)
Feinstein has faced considerable criticism during the Kavanaugh confirmation process, including the timeline of her actions after receiving a letter from Ford that detailed her allegations of assault. The senator has said she was simply trying to respect Ford’s request for privacy; Republicans have instead accused Feinstein of stalling so she could drop a bombshell on the SCOTUS nominee late in the game and hurt his chances of getting the job.
Some anti-Kavanaugh activists reportedly think Feinstein’s methodical, low-key style just isn’t cutting it as the Republicans are on the verge of getting the nomination to a vote, although the longtime lawmaker has also been praised for being fair.
KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND
PHOTO: Drew Angerer
The New York senator has a record of speaking out against sexual assault, particularly in the military—and she opposed Kavanaugh well before the current scandal engulfed his nomination.
Gillibrand, a Democrat who’s often mentioned as a potential 2020 presidential contender although she hasn’t confirmed those rumors, has flatly suggested Kavanaugh is a hyper-conservative would be a threat to abortion rights and women’s health care. She’s also questioned his past positions on the exercise of presidential power.
In July, well before the news broke of Ford’s allegations against Kavanaugh, Gillibrand told Glamour she considered the judge “more dangerous than any previous justice nominee because of his education and his experience and because of the track record he’s laid out about what he intends to do,” adding, “I think he is going to be very destructive to basic civil rights and civil liberties for millions of Americans.”
Thursday night, Gillibrand urged people to change the game by showing up on Election Day.
“If the Senate was 51% women, would SCOTUS nominees look like Brett Kavanaugh, or like Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor?” she asked. “Let’s elect record numbers of women so our high offices are held by leaders who’ll do the most good for the most people.”
KAMALA HARRIS
PHOTO: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
The former California attorney general has put her prosecutorial skills to work as a member of the Judiciary Committee, peppering Kavanaugh with pointed questions during the confirmation hearings.
Her intensity wasn’t much of a surprise: Harris, a Democrat, got plenty of attention for grilling now-U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions during his Judiciary interviews as well.
Harris is only the second black woman elected to the Senate in American history (the first was Sen. Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois) and has made a name for herself in public life as a fighter against racial inequity, both inside and outside the criminal justice system—and a lawmaker with a cool head.
Some forecasters have said the combination of passion and compassion Harris has evinced in the political arena, and her calls to elevate the American debate beyond the “mean” tone of the Trump era, could be a blueprint for a potential run for the White House. She’s not tipping her hand on a future campaign just yet.
The Hawaii senator is not a prospective candidate for president—she can’t seek the Oval Office, having been born outside the U.S.—but her standout role as a Kavanaugh interrogator has some people wishing she could.
Hirono, a Democrat who serves on Judiciary, notably asked Kavanaugh well before the Ford allegations surfaced whether he had ever engaged in sexual harassment or assault. (He said he had not.) As the New Yorkernoted, Hirono said she posed the question because she “did not want the #MeToo movement to be swept under the rug,” not because she had any heads-up about the coming scandal.
The cancer survivor, who is also the only immigrant currently serving in the Senate, also made a point of asking Kavanaugh about his attitudes toward indigenous peoples—and releasing a 2002 email (which had been marked “confidential”) that included his views on a legal question regarding Native Hawaiians.
Hirono said in the hearings that his views on the status of native peoples should be considered offensive—and not just by Hawaiians. Read on for why that matters in more ways than one…
AMY KLOBUCHAR
PHOTO: Chip Somodevilla
While a Democrat, Klobuchar, the senior senator from the swing state of Minnesota has been described as somewhat more moderate than some of her colleagues. That might not be in vogue in 2018, when hard-charging liberals (and even some self-identified Democratic socialists) are exciting some midterm voters. The landscape could look different in 2020, when a Trump challenger might try to appeal to Americans on both the left and right of the political spectrum.
Klobuchar is the fourth Democratic woman who serves on Judiciary (all the Republicans are men). She had a memorable question for her male colleagues who sat in opposition to letting the FBI investigate the allegations against Kavanaugh: “What are you hiding?”
At least as memorable: The moment Klobuchar asked Kavanaugh if he’d ever blacked out from drinking, only to have him throw the question back at her. He later apologized to Klobuchar, who said in a CNN interview that she’d been “stunned” by his conduct during the Judiciary hearing.
Klobuchar was also among the Democrats who had off-mic conversations with Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake, who ultimately pushed his GOP colleagues to give the FBI more time to look into Kavanaugh’s past before a Senate vote.
LISA MURKOWSKI
PHOTO: Drew Angerer
Like Collins, Murkowski is a pro-choice Republican woman, and whether she’ll ultimately come down for or against Kavanaugh has been keeping the pundits speculating.
The Alaska senator’s office told the Anchorage Daily News on Thursday that she, like Collins, is reviewing the FBI files—although Murkowski had not gone so far as her Maine counterpart in calling the investigation “thorough.” She has, however, acknowledged that the pressure is on from both sides, and that her office has been flooded with emails and calls about the confirmation.
Murkowski and Collins both also criticized Trump after he ridiculed Ford’s testimony and portrayed Kavanaugh as a victim of character assassination during a Tuesday rally in Mississippi.
For Murkowski, however, Hirono’s question to the judge about indigenous peoples may carry extra significance: As the Daily News has reported, Alaska Native organizations that helped her win a big 2010 Senate race consider Kavanaugh a potential danger to tribal authority, are out in force against him, and are making sure Murkowski knows it.
ELIZABETH WARREN
PHOTO: Zach Gibson
The Massachusetts senator—and possible 2020 contender—isn’t a member of the Judiciary Committee, but she’s been outspoken on opposing the Kavanaugh nomination.
“The fact that Republicans want to go forward treating [Ford] and other women who have come forward as if their claims don’t matter is an insult to every single woman in this country,” she told Glamour in Washington on the day of Ford’s testimony to Judiciary last week. “It is fundamentally wrong.”
Warren was also among the luminaries who protested Kavanaugh on Thursday, telling a rally crowd, “I am angry on behalf of women who have been told to sit down and shut up one time too many.”
There are no bridges left to burn between Trump and Warren: The president has mockingly called her “Pocahontas” in questioning her self-described Native American heritage; Warren has been a steady critic of the administration’s policies, including on federal family planning funding.
While she hasn’t officially committed to challenging Trump, Warren was recently quoted saying she’d take a “hard look” at it after the Nov. 6 midterms.
Celeste Katz is senior politics reporter for Glamour. Send news tips, questions, and comments to celeste_katz@condenast.com.
The Good Place actress Jameela Jamil has never shied away from tackling society’s obsession with dictating and policing how women “should” look. Earlier this year, she launched an Instagram account called “I Weigh” that seeks to measure women by “achievements and experiences, not pounds and kilograms” and later poured her feelings into a powerful piece for Glamour.com: “Our culture is obsessed with women’s appearances, and it’s holding us back as a gender.”
Now, she’s back in the spotlight for taking on these issues again. She went on a podcast from the U.K.’s Channel 4 late last week and talked specifically about the Kardashians, whom she has called out in the past for promoting unrealistic standards of beauty to young girls. After Kim Kardashian posted an ad promoting an appetite-suppressant lollipop in May, Jamil had screenshot the images and written on Twitter, “No. Fuck off. No. You terrible and toxic influence on young girls,” she wrote on Twitter. “I admire their mother’s branding capabilities, she is an exploitative but innovative genius, however this family makes me feel actual despair over what women are reduced to.”
On the Channel 4 podcast, hosted by Krishnan Guru-Murthy, Jamil elaborated about why she called the Kardashians toxic—and how she feels their influence embodies the idea of a “double agent for the patriarchy.”
“The double agent for the patriarchy is basically just a woman who perhaps unknowingly is putting the patriarchal narrative out into the world,” she said, adding later, “But it’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing: Just because you look like a woman, we trust you and we think you’re on our side, but you are selling us something that really doesn’t make us feel good… You’re selling us self-consciousness.”
Watch the full interview here:
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While many people embraced Jamil’s criticism as constructive, the Internet was quickly divided. Some pointed out that in the past, Jamil has made comments about the sexuality of artists like Beyoncé and Miley Cyrus. “Jameela Jamil has history for policing/shaming women for ~using their sexuality~ & it’s so tedious,” one Twitter user wrote.
In the Guardian on Sunday, Frances Ryan had a different take than Jamil.
She wrote about why calling Kardashian “a double agent for the patriarchy” can be problematic—but also argued that Jamil made an important point worth exploring: “Still, blaming other women for misogyny has always felt uncomfortable—like you are doing patriarchy’s job by turning on women pressured to conform to sexism, rather than critiquing the male-dominated structures that got us here. But Jamil is surely speaking out about a side to sexism that is worth confronting.”
There are more than a few sides to sexism and misogyny worth confronting, and whether or not you agree with Jamil, it’s worth considering the mixed messages the Kardashians send under the guise of being feminist—and figuring out how they fit into how you define (and live out) the concept.
As Clinton and Trump faced off on October 9, 2016, and tackled subjects like ISIS and taxes, the then-Republican nominee personally attacked Clinton, saying she was the “devil” with hate in her heart and downplayed his lewd comments about women as “locker room talk.”
On top of the personal attacks, Trump snakily moved around the stage and aggressively stood too close behind Clinton as she spoke. Many women watching at home—who were well familiar with that feeling of discomfort when an aggressive male deliberately inserts himself in your space—wanted her to stand up to Trump right then. Instead, Clinton kept things professional.
Back to the present: On Saturday, Clinton told young audience members at the Playa Vista, California, summit what she really wanted to say at that debate and why she kept her mouth shut instead.
Given the timing of the debate, which came just after the infamous Access Hollywood tapes were leaked, Clinton knew Trump would be on edge and desperate to win the debate.
“So I said, ‘We have to be calm,’ and I maintained my composure,” Clinton said to Black-ish and Grown-ish star Yara Shahidi, who moderated the panel.
But the double standard that caused her to keep her mouth shut didn’t hit her until after the debate.
“I thought about that, and what would have happened if I spun around and said, ‘You love to intimidate women, but back up, you creep!’ I think it would have been really satisfying. But I also think given the way women are covered..they would have said, ‘She can’t take it,’ or, ‘We don’t want an angry woman in the Oval Office.’”
Clinton also briefly touches on the topic in her book, What Happened, and frequently contemplates what would’ve happened if she stood up for herself at the debate.
“It sure would have made for better TV,” she wrote. “Maybe I have over-learned the lesson of staying calm, biting my tongue, digging my fingernails into a clenched fist—smiling all the while, determined to present a composed face to the world.”
At the summit, she drew from her experiences during the debate—and over the course of her life—to dish some wisdom to those in the audience.
“We have to make it not only safe for women, we have to make it possible for us to express a full range of human emotion…without being so negatively judged,” she said. “Remember when he called me a nasty woman? All of that stuff he did didn’t end up hurting him that much because men are given a much broader range of emotions to demonstrate their authentic feelings.”
“Be part of the changing culture so it’s not viewed as disqualifying if you’re standing up for yourself and speaking up for yourself,” Clinton added.
