In the United States, women struggled for more than 100-years from our nation’s founding to secure the right to vote with the passage of the 19th Amendment; however, even this historic moment did not end the disparities between men and women. It would not be until 1963 in a report released by a commission, chaired by Eleanor Roosevelt, that the nation would understand the workplace discrimination that women were subjected to. The following year, with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, women received much-deserved workplace protections against such discrimination (in 1979, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act explicitly expanded this protection to women who are pregnant).
In 1967, President Johnson expanded his executive order on affirmative action to include gender. Less than 10-years later, women were protected in the financial services industry with the passage of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act. In 1994, the Violence Against Women Act sought to address domestic violence and rape as a national concern with federal penalties. More recently, under President Obama, the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act (2009) improves legislation allowing women to file complaints with the federal government related to gender-based pay discrepancies and in 2013 the military lifted the ban on women serving in combat roles.
This is a mighty history and it’s a history that has been fought with blood, sweat, and tears. It’s a history that we cannot afford to taint with someone like Donald Trump.
What has been disclosed over the past 72-hours about Donald Trump’s comments about women speaks clearly to the type of “man” — or, more accurately, lack thereof — that Donald Trump is.
Those attempting to rationalize Trump’s comments are shameful. In an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper, Rudy Giuliani seemed to imply that most men have spoken about women in the way Trump did on the “hot wire” with Access Hollywood. Jake Tapper’s response to Giuliani was spot-on: “I’ve been in locker rooms, I’ve been a member of a fraternity. I have never heard any man ever brag about being able to maul women because they get away with it. Never.”
Donald Trump’s comments on this video cannot be defended or explained away. The reality is that this video does not reveal something new about Trump’s character, but rather is merely the next chapter in a history of misogyny and predator-like behavior.
The Donald is not worthy of this nation’s highest office. He is a stain on the fabric of democracy and anyone arguing that he’s more “fit” to lead this country is in dire need of a history lesson and for that you can reread the first paragraph of this article to understand why we cannot afford to have this nation’s history on women’s rights cannot be threatened by a serial misogynist.
