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Watch Sexual Assault Survivors Confront Sen. Jeff Flake After He Confirms Kavanaugh Vote


Sexual assault survivors confronted Senator Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) and shared their experiences of abuse on Capitol Hill Friday morning, just moments after he announced his plans to back Judge Brett Kavanaugh in Friday’s Senate Judiciary Committee vote.

The Committee’s vote to move Kavanaugh’s nomination forward was scheduled less than 24 hours after the country heard tense and emotional testimony from both Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford, the woman who has accused him of sexual assaulting her in 1982. While Flake, a key Republican swing vote, had indicated that he was undecided about Kavanaugh, he released a statement sharing his intentions to bring the embattled nominee closer to the Supreme Court. A short time later, a group of protesters followed Flake to an elevator and let him know what message he was sending to women and to survivors of assault.

“I was sexually assaulted and nobody believed me,” one woman told him through tears. “I didn’t tell anyone, and you’re telling all women that they don’t matter, that they should just stay quiet because if they tell you what happened to them, you’re going to ignore them. That’s what happened to me, and that’s what you’re telling all women in America, that they don’t matter, that they just keep it to themselves.”

Flake remained silent during the exchange, looking down at the ground. The woman continued, urging him, “Don’t look away from me. You’re telling me that my assault doesn’t matter… That’s what you’re telling me when you vote for him.”

“Senator Flake, do you think that Brett Kavanaugh is telling the truth?,” another woman asked.

Eventually, a reporter asks Flake if he wants to respond to the protesters’ concerns. Flake says simple, “No, I need to go to the hearing. I just issued a statement, I’ll be saying more as well.”

In his statement, Flake said that he hadn’t seen enough evidence that corroborated Ford’s story.

“Yesterday, we heard compelling testimony from Dr. Ford, as well as a persuasive response from Judge Kavanaugh. I wish that I could express the confidence that some of my colleagues have conveyed about what either did or did not happen in the early 1980s, but I left the hearing yesterday with as much doubt as certainty,” he said.

His vote is expected to round out support in the Judiciary Committee. After Friday’s vote, Kavanaugh’s nomination will continue to move through a full Senate vote. Republican leaders have said they will push to confirm Kavanaugh by early next week.

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Elizabeth Warren Has a Powerful Message for Sexual Assault Survivors Watching the Kavanaugh Hearing


Senator Elizabeth Warren (D—Mass.) on Thursday spoke with Glamour exclusively about the historic Senate hearing involving Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and the Republican push to move forward with his confirmation, calling it “fundamentally wrong.”

At the Hart Senate Office building, where Kavanaugh’s accuser Christine Blasey Ford was also testifying, Warren stood alongside Ford’s supporters, telling Glamour that she was, “here with people of conscience who believe that when a woman comes forward that she has a right to be listened to, and there needs to be a full investigation.”

“The fact that Republicans want to go forward treating this woman 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 said. “It is fundamentally wrong.”

Ford appeared in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday morning to give her testimony of an event that she says occurred more than 30 years ago, when Kavanaugh allegedly pinned her to a bed, attempted to take her clothes off and covered her mouth with his hand as she screamed.

“I believed he was going to rape me. It was hard for me to breathe and I believed that Brett was going to accidentally kill me,” she told the committee.

As she spoke, people supportive of Ford gathered outside in the atrium of the Hart Senate Office building. Many listened to the simulcast of the professor’s testimony on their cell phones, at times looking anguished or openly crying. Some silently held their fists in the air; others wore strips of tape over their mouths.

PHOTO: Zach Gibson

When asked if she believed that Kavanaugh would still be confirmed despite multiple women accusing him of sexual assault, Warren said, “I don’t know. I truly don’t know. But I do know that people across this country are paying attention, and that this is not alright.”

She also went on to criticize her Republican colleagues, saying, “this is a moral question.”

“The fact that [Republicans] want to ram this through and not have an investigation, that [Senator] Mitch McConnell goes in front of his big donors and says I’m going to ram this thing through, it’s not right. That treats every woman with disrespect. It treats everyone who has been a victim of sexual assault with disrespect. It treats human beings as if their claims are meaningless and that powerful men can do whatever they want to do. And it’s just not right.”

You can watch the Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee, here.





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Jennifer Aniston Is Teaming Up With Parkland Survivors to Speak Out About Gun Control


Jennifer Aniston has been one of the most famous women in the world since the ’90s. But while the press was focused on her personal life and Friends fame, few established where Aniston stands on important issues. When you speak to Aniston, though, it’s clear she feels passionately—about gun control, about our country’s future, and about finding the right moment to speak out.

Enter WE Day, an event that brings together young people dedicated to making a difference with world-renowned speakers, celebrities, and performers to kick off a year of social action. At this year’s event, which took place in California in April, Aniston teamed up with Parkland survivors Cameron Kasky and Jaclyn Corin. (A one-hour special about WE Day airs this Friday on ABC.)

For Aniston, it was a chance to work with future leaders. “It’s just an incredible thing to be amongst these young powerful people who are our future and making a difference,” she tells Glamour. “It’s wonderful to sit back and actually know that we’re going to be OK because of this generation.”

To say the actress was impressed by the young people she met, including Kasky and Corin, would be a massive understatement. “I think it’s just remarkable to watch what’s happened [after the Parkland shooting],” she says. “I just think, ‘Thank god.’ You know, as I watched what these kids were doing I told my team that I wanted to get involved, but I didn’t know what that looked like. Was it a documentary? What was it? I knew I didn’t want it to be celebrity-fueled. I wanted to hear the voices of these kids.”

“I think that growing up in the digital age or the social media age has given them a voice to connect people,” she continues. “Sometimes there’s just not that human contact thanks to phones, but this generation is using it in a different way. I really think that people from both parties are listening. It just feels different, like there has been an actual shift.”

As for the issue of gun control itself, Aniston is a long-time supporter. “We’ve been doing things for a while, like PSAs [about the issue], ads, and it hasn’t worked. I just don’t know why this is such a hard issue to fix,” she says. “It seems like it should be simpler. Nobody is trying to take away the right to bear arms. It’s just about adding a little structure around it and making it harder to buy a gun than to drive a car, you know?”

Of course, Kasky and Corin are happy to have Aniston on their side. “We’re so happy she’s working with us on this,” Kasky told Glamour. Corin agrees, “We’re grateful she’s using the platform that she’s created in another way to amplify the voices of the young people, because that’s what is really important.”

“We sometimes get starstruck,” Kasky continues. “Like there was one young woman from Memphis who has been helping the homeless people in that city, or thousands of others like her who are helping the world because they want to make it better.”

The pair, who are two of the leading voices in the March for Our Lives movement, shared strategies with some of other activists taking part in WE Day and spoke about their plans for community outreach, which took the form of the Road to Change bus tour across America this summer.

“The most important thing is getting to see other students who have seen what we’ve done and want to seek out the leadership positions that we were thrust into,” Kasky says. “That gives us energy, them stepping into the positions of leadership. Pleasant comments on the Internet are nice, but what really energizes us and keeps us going is seeing other kids taking action, like with the walkouts across the country on March 14.”

“We’re going to people, doing face-to-face educating, and making sure people are voting,” Corin adds. “That’s our plan for the summer and after—all the way through the midterms and beyond too.”

The WE Day 2018 special airs on ABC on August 17, 8 PM ET.



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Watch 141 Larry Nassar Survivors Receive Arthur Ashe Award at the 2018 ESPYS


The 2018 ESPY awards—the annual broadcast that honors athletic achievement—took a powerfully emotional turn when it came time to hand out the Arthur Ashe Award for Courage, which went to the survivors who bravely spoke out against Larry Nassar, the doctor who earlier this year was convicted of multiple counts of sexual abuse and will be spending the rest of his life in prison. During his two trials, more than 100 young women gave powerful victim statements (or had statements read on their behalf) about how his abuse affected their lives.

During Wednesday’s ceremony, Olympic gold medalist Aly Raisman, former Michigan State softball player Tiffany Thomas Lopez, and gymnast Sarah Klein, speaking out for the first time tonight, accepted the award.

“We’re about to tell you a story that is difficult to hear,” said Jennifer Garner, introducing the award. “A story about what can happen in sports goes terribly wrong … We have to hear it…to make sure it never happens again.”

“Abuse. Silence. Victory. Abuse. Silence. Victory. The cycle was repeated for generations,” Garner continued in a voiceover of a moving short film featuring many of the women.

All together, 141 women—including Klein, Raisman, and Thomas-Lopez—came to the stage as the video concluded, creating an image that will not easily be forgotten.

“It is such a privilege to stand up here with my sister survivors as we represent hundreds more who are not with us tonight,” Klein said. “Make no mistake we are here on this stage to present an image for the world to see, a portrait of survival, a new vision of courage.” And she did not hold back when it came to calling out the United States Olympic Committee, USA Gymnastics, and Michigan State University, saying they placed “money and medals above the safety of child athletes.”

Raisman echoed that sentiment in her speech as she listed the many years, beginning in 1997, that someone spoke up about Nassar’s abused and was not believed “in favor of money, medals, and reputation.” She called attention to the inaction of so many over 30 years of Nassar’s crimes. “The ripple effect of our actions, or inactions, can be enormous, spanning generations,” she said. “Perhaps the greatest tragedy of this nightmare is that it could have been avoided … All we needed was one adult to have the integrity to stand between us and Larry Nassar. If just one adult had listened, believed, and acted, the people standing before you on this stage would have never met him. … To all the survivors out there, don’t let anyone rewrite your story. Your truth does matter. You matter. And you are not alone.”

The message may have been hard to hear, but it was also hopeful. “As a survivor, I am here to say that if we can just give person the courage to use their voice, this is worth it,” said Klein. “If one more victim of sexual abuse feels less alone tonight, then our suffering has meaning.”

And Raisman concluded her speech with a simple, yet impactful statement: “We may suffer alone, but we survive together.”

The ESPY audience—which included Nassar prosecutor Angela Povilaitis and detective Andrea Munford, who were thanked by Klein—gave the award recipients a standing ovation. Also in attendance to support the young women—and receive a heartfelt thank you from Raisman: Judge Rosemarie Aquilina, who let every victim who wanted to speak do so during the sentencing phase of Nassar’s trial. She famously told Rachel Denhollander, the first to give her statement, “You started the tidal wave. You made all of this happen. You made all of these voices matter…You are the bravest person I have ever had in my courtroom.”

“For 25 years, the Arthur Ashe Award for Courage has been given to those who change the world in important ways and the future will undoubtedly be different because of the actions of these heroic women,” said the show’s producer Maura Mandt, prior to the 2018 ceremony. “This tribute will reflect the awe and admiration these individuals deserve.”

The social media reaction to the “Sister Survivors” was swift and supportive.

Since breaking her silence on Nassar, olympic gymnast Raisman—perhaps Nassar’s most well-known survivor—has continued to speak out on behalf of victims of abuse everywhere and launched an initiative called Flip the Switch, to protect athletes from sexual assault. Thomas-Lopez says that she told trainers about what she endured during Nassar’s “treatments” while she was a student at Michigan State University but was dissuaded from filing a formal complaint. She eventually quit playing softball, the sport that landed her a scholarship to MSU. Klein, too, has continued to stay involved, attending a Senate hearing in June that attempted to uncover who knew what, and when, inside the USA Gymnastics organization.

ESPN the Magazine also made Raisman a cover star of their new “Heroes Issues”.

Ashe was a tennis champion and an activist who used his platform to advocate for human rights—speaking out against apartheid and later sharing his struggle with AIDS. According to ESPN, “Recipients [of the award] reflect the spirit of Arthur Ashe, possessing strength in the face of adversity, courage in the face of peril and the willingness to stand up for their beliefs no matter what the cost.”

Past honorees include athletes Muhammad Ali and Billie Jean King, news anchor and activist Robin Roberts, and TV personality and activist Caitlyn Jenner. It’s almost always a tear-inducing moment that reminds us all how sports can bring the world together and the impact that athletes’ voices can have for the greater good.





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Jeff Sessions Just Made It Impossible for Domestic Violence Survivors to Qualify for U.S. Asylum


A new ruling issued Monday by U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions stands to put women who are fleeing gender-based or gang violence in their home countries in danger by turning them away from the nation’s borders.

In short, immigrants under the threat of domestic violence will not qualify for asylum in the United States, a move that has left critics baffled by what dangers do qualify for protection. The decision is likely to affect tens of thousands of people hoping to have their immigration cases reviewed, and is a particularly blow to women who have come to this country to escape instances of violence.

“The mere fact that a country may have problems effectively policing certain crimes — such as domestic violence or gang violence — or that certain populations are more likely to be victims of crime, cannot itself establish an asylum claim,” Sessions wrote in his 31-page opinion.

Sessions came to this conclusion after personally intervening in Matter of A-B-, a case that revolves around a woman from El Salvador, who had said she had been sexually, emotionally and physically abused by her husband for more than 15 years. She had been granted asylum through the Board of Immigration Appeals on the grounds that, as a woman unable to leave a violent relationship or receive protection from her government, she had suffered persecution related to her particular social group.

However, Sessions reversed the board’s ruling, saying it had “been wrongly decided.” His move represents a much tougher stance on immigration and a sharp change in previous policies that had been more sympathetic to survivors of domestic violence since 2014, when a kind of precedent had been set by the case of a Guatemalan woman named Aminta Cifuentes. She was granted asylum after describing how her husband had burned her with acid and punched her—even when she was pregnant— for over a decade. After Cifuentes, other victims who had left their countries shared similar arguments for why they should receive asylum protections in the U.S.

Immigrant rights activists have pointed out that Sessions’ ruling will hit hardest when it comes to women fleeing areas like Central America and parts of Mexico, where gang and gender-based violence is especially high. According to a 2015 United Nations report, a “surging tide of violence” has swept over countries like El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, forcing thousands of women and children to leave their homes every month. As part of the report, women told the UN they faced violence—such as rape, assault, extortion and threats by gangs—on a daily basis. Escaping to the U.S. and asking for asylum was often a final recourse for such victims

“What this decision does is yank us all back to the Dark Ages of human rights and women’s human rights and the conceptualization of it,” Karen Musalo, a defense lawyer on the case, told the New York Times.



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Santa Fe High School Shooting Survivors Call for an End to Gun Violence 'Inaction'


Following a deadly shooting at Texas’ Santa Fe High School that left eight students and two teachers dead, survivors organized a press conference in west Houston on Friday to call for stricter gun laws and tougher gun violence prevention strategies across the country.

Students specifically spoke out against politicians who “think that doing nothing is acceptable.” The emotionally charged event received support from March For Our Lives organizers, who also came together earlier this year after a student opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida, killing 17 people and sparking national outrage. The incident at Santa Fe High School has put their efforts back in the news as students and advocates again ask for more than thoughts and prayers.

“The truth is that whatever we are doing as a society—or not doing—is not working,” Megan McGuire, a junior at Santa Fe High School, said. “Inaction is not an option. We must do something, and we must get it right. School safety is a complex issue.”

Celebrities have taken up call for action as well: On Sunday at the 2018 Billboard Music Awards, Kelly Clarkson decided to swap a moment of silence remembering the victims of the shooting for what she called a “moment of acton.”

“I’m so sick of moments of silence. It’s not working. Like, obviously,” she said. “So why don’t we not do a moment of silence? Why don’t we do a moment of action? Why don’t we do a moment of change? Why don’t we change what’s happening? Because it’s horrible.”

According to ABC News, the survivors of the Santa Fe High School shooting made it clear that they were not looking to remove guns from their owners.

McGuire explained that her dad and grandparents are gun owners: “I don’t want to take away their guns, or your guns for that matter. What I mean by gun safety is common-sense solutions to keep those who wish to harm themselves or others from obtaining guns.”

But the most resounding message at Friday’s press conference was targeted at politicians who refuse to act.

“I want to thank everyone for all of their thoughts and prayers; they are very needed and appreciated. But I do have something for elected officials who think that doing nothing is acceptable,” McGuire said. “My thought is that if you do not do something, you do not have a prayer of being elected. My generation will see to that.”

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