How's it going America,
Check out our latest episode of The Pod Millennial! I talk to the formerly incarcerated women's rights activist Amie Ichikawa about what it's like when men do time in women's prisons and college volleyball player Brooke Slusser on the blowback she got when she called out the injustice of having a man on her team. Brand new episodes drop every Tuesday! Listen, rate (5 stars, of course!), and subscribe!
Let's get into it:
After a bunch of nasty sexual allegations against Eric Swalwell, the congressman has decided to suspend his gubernatorial campaign in California, which really just means it's over, but he hasn't said it yet. The allegations are pretty serious, mostly from women who refused to use their names in leveling the accusations. But they are also years old, meaning that the woman who says Swalwell raped her in 2019 never went to the police or reported it at the time, meaning that she waited until his political prospects were on the rise before coming forward with it. And when she did come forward, it was to CNN and not the cops.
While I'm no fan of Swalwell, I'm even less of a fan of politically motivated sex allegations from years past. Swalwell isn't, though, so by his own rules, he's earned this. Back in 2018, he posed a big opposition to Brett Kavanaugh over the spurious sexual misconduct allegations leveled at him. "What are the chances that three or four women, independently, who never met each other, would have similar experiences with one person?" Swalwell remarked on MSNBC at the time. "So either this person committed these horrific acts, or he is the single unluckiest person in the world for these people to conspire and make up lies against him. But it's a very hard case to make, the more allegations that come in and even the counter example."
Swalwell also suggested that the alleged victims should be brought into Congress and questioned. "I saw continued demeaning of victims of sexual assault, people who deserve to be heard, who deserve for their allegations to be investigated," Swalwell said in the same MSNBC hit, "and a president who wants to just rush this through, he criticized the Senate for even taking this long Ari and so for Brett Kavanaugh sake, if he is innocent, I hope tomorrow he opens his statement and says, You know what, bring in all the victims, allow them to be heard, allow them to be questioned. That will clear his name if He's indeed innocent, and if he's not, for the sake of the credibility of the court, I hope that the senators would vote against him."
I don't know if Swalwell did the things he's accused of, but I do know that the timing is particularly suspect. The modern-day political hit isn't one of graft or bribery, but of sex stuff. Swalwell tried to deny the allegations, he said any of his misdeeds were between him and his wife, but in the end, one anonymous woman who points fingers and shouts rape has the power to take a man down if the political powers-that-be back it.
Libby