“New York Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said on Tuesday night that she believes the Democratic Party has an obligation to examine a sexual assault allegation made against presumptive Democratic Presidential nominee Joe Biden by Tara Reade,” reports Daniel Villarreal for Newsweek.
AOC was the first democrat to speak out on Reade’s behalf, and I’m grateful for her courage to stand up for what is right.
Today, Bernie Sanders echoed her sentiment in an interview with CBS. "I think it's relevant to talk about anything. And I think every woman who feels she has been assaulted has every right in the world to stand up and make her claims," Sanders said, as reported in the Week.
While Sanders has already endorsed Biden, something he pledged to do from the beginning of his presidential campaign, Ocasio-Cortez has refused to do the same.
By contrast, last night the Nation published a glaringly biased article by Joan Walsh full of blatant rape apologism. It’s such an awful piece of journalism that I refuse to link it here. You’re welcome, of course, to google it and read it on your own time, but please take a hefty content/trigger warning on the content of the article before subjecting yourself to it.
Katie Halper tweeted screenshots comparing the differences between the headline of Joan Walsh’s article about Kavanaugh with the headline for her article on Biden.
On April 14th Jacobin published an article outlining the media’s wildly differing coverage of other major rape allegations by the mainstream media, and it is quite damning. Referring to the New York Times, Washington Post, and NBC News, Branco Marcetic writes, “When Kavanaugh was accused in 2018, all three of these outlets had reported on the allegation against him the day it broke, when the only source was a letter none of the reporters involved had even seen; when it was Biden, they took nearly three weeks, despite the existence of two people corroborating the accuser’s story from the beginning.”
When I read last night in Mother Jones that Elizabeth Warren told Rachel Maddow she would say yes to Biden if he asked her to be his VP, I wrote a stream of consciousness about how this election could have gone much differently:
Imagine that when Tara Reade approached Elizabeth Warren’s campaign that Warren spoke to her, believed her, and became her champion. Warren, along with Kamala Harris, bring Reade’s credible allegation to light during the debates. Biden is forced to respond to these allegations directly. The pressure against him from citizens and politicians to step down is overwhelming. He is pushed out of the primary and forced to step down. All of the democrats who spoke out against Brett Kavanaugh and Al Franken and Donald Trump have united against nominating a man accused of rape to the presidency of the United States, regardless of his party affiliation. All of this takes place while there are still 10 candidates in the primaries, and they continue to campaign and debate against one another. One of them gets the nomination and becomes the democratic nominee. It is November. I vote for this person, and they beat Donald Trump by a landslide. I vote for this person because they have not been accused of rape, defined by the Department of Justice as "penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.” They win the election for a party united behind the idea that believing women is not a partisan ideal, and that no rape is too small to disqualify a man for public office, no matter how old he is, regardless of how often he did it or if it happened only once.
Now think about what actually happened.
In addition to her excitement at the thought of being Biden's VP pick, Elizabeth Warren endorsed him yesterday.
This is a shocking departure from the Warren who single handedly took down Bloomberg’s presidential campaign during a democratic debate in February.
Nevertheless, the movement of survivors who are unwilling to vote for Biden grows daily, with articles like this one from Vice offering hope and solidarity during these deeply dismal days.
“Survivors say Reade’s allegation—and the many other accusations that preceded it—don’t need to be “worse” than those against Trump for them to matter. Suggesting otherwise, they say, invites voters to rank people’s traumas.” - Marie Solis for Vice
While Jessica Valenti and I disagree on our willingness to vote for Biden, her medium piece does the bare minimum by neither attacking Tara Reade nor downplaying the importance of discussing her allegation. She writes, “We can beat Trump while still being honest about who Biden is. It’s what we have to do.”
If you have not yet read the transcript of Tara Reade’s podcast interview with Katie Halper on Current Affairs, I strongly suggest that you do so. It’s disturbing and horrifying that many of the articles denouncing her claims have not so much as spoken to her.
While this situation continues to trigger and depress me daily, I am encouraged and uplifted by the few who have begun to stand up for what is right. Let us continue to fight for Biden to step down. We know in our hearts it’s the right choice, and slowly we are beginning to see our perspective reflected by the brave few willing to acknowledge these allegations and give them the attention they deserve.
Keep sharing, keep loving, keep fighting.
#IBelieveTaraReade