Be aware: Women are watching
lawmakers worked to discredit Ford by suggesting that she was either hopelessly confused, a political pawn or a liar. They watched in disbelief as Republicans repeatedly declined to call for an independent investigation into Ford’s allegations, much less subsequent ones brought by Deborah Ramirez and Julie Swetnick. They watched in frustration as Republicans failed to call material witnesses or outside experts to testify.
And women were watching when the Senate Judiciary Committee spent a day listening to the testimony of Kavanaugh and Ford. Women saw how the 11 Republican men brought in a female prosecutor to chip away at Ford’s account, while showing little interest in the alleged attack. They saw how those same Republican men then tripped over themselves to assure Kavanaugh that they felt his pain and were so very sorry that Democrats had, as Sen. Lindsey Graham shrieked, put the nominee “through hell.”
Less than 24 hours later, the committee advanced Kavanaugh’s nomination to the full Senate on a party-line vote of 11-10.
Republican lawmakers said all along that they were going to do this. When the accusations against the nominee surfaced, Orrin Hatch and Graham rushed to assure their base — and their president — that whatever Ford had to say would not alter their support. Some Republicans dismissed her story as false. Others judged that, even if it was true, it didn’t matter. Collectively, they made clear their determination to, as Mcconnell memorably put it, “plow right through.”
Still, it’s hard to believe that they showed so little interest, especially in the face of the public turmoil this episode has stirred up. Ford’s story, and the way it has been met with sneering disbelief, has resonated with women in a way that even many of the #Metoo horror stories did not. It feels as if everyone knows someone who has pulled them aside in recent weeks to share a similarly wrenching experience.
Galvanized by watching Ford get ripped apart, women — along with similarly outraged men — have staged walkouts and sit-ins and have flocked to Capitol Hill. The hashtag #Whyididntreport caught fire online as women poured out stories of why they had long been afraid to speak out about their own experiences with sexual assault.
In response, Republican men have largely shrugged their shoulders — or worse, shifted into high dudgeon, issuing stern lectures about how such “character assassinations” will drive good men away from public service and how the real danger here is that this nation’s sons and husbands will become vulnerable to false or insignificant accusations.
This is a message of fear, resentment and male victimhood being sold as sympathetic concern for mothers and wives who could soon see their beloved males torn down by political plots. It’s a rich message coming from some of the same conservative corners that dismissed Ford’s allegations with the rationalization that boys will be boys.
Such attitudes reflect the broader values of this president and his party.
Trump’s Cabinet contains few women’s voices. The president himself has been endlessly forgiving of men with reputations for mistreating women, such as Roy Moore, Bill O’reilly, Bill Shine and Rob Porter.
In policy terms, the administration has proved hostile to women on matters of reproductive health, chipping away at abortion rights and curtailing access to birth control. It also has worked to weaken protections for victims of sexual violence.
Maybe Republicans don’t care about the message they’re sending. They’ve been losing ground with women for years now. Why bother trying?
But this is a dangerous lesson. Women have stepped up to run for office in record numbers. Polls show the gender gap to be growing ever wider in terms of whom women plan to vote for. The Kavanaugh debacle is unlikely to help. After the allegations against him surfaced, a similar gender gap began opening up in terms of who supported his nomination.
From atop his tower of self-pity, Kavanaugh warned that the partisan plot to tank his nomination would haunt Democrats. “You sowed the wind,” he bellowed. “For decades to come, I fear the whole country will reap the whirlwind.”
We don’t know about the whole country. But, where more and more women are concerned, Republicans are overdue for a reckoning. And, without a course correction far more dramatic than the frantic shuffling spurred by Flake’s last-minute pang of conscience, the damage GOP lawmakers are doing to their party could last for decades.