'Don't Look Away From Me': Jeff Flake Confronted by Assault Survivors After Backing Kavanaugh

Just minutes after announcing he would vote to confirm Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake was confronted by a series of women who angrily shared their stories of sexual assault while he simply nodded awkwardly in the corner of a Capitol Hill elevator.

“What you are doing is allowing someone who actually violated a woman to sit in the Supreme Court. This is not tolerable!” one distraught woman yelled at Flake, as he stood nervously glancing back and forth between her and the elevator control panel.

“You have children in your family, Think of them!” the woman tearfully continued.

“I was sexually assaulted, and no body believed me,” another woman chimed in. “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.”

“Look at me when I’m talking to you,” she pleaded moments later as she broke down crying. “You’re telling me that my assault doesn’t matter. That what happened to me doesn’t matter, and that you’re going to let people who do these things into power. That’s what you’re telling me when you vote for him. Don’t look away from me, look at me and tell me that it doesn’t matter what happened to me.”

Pressed on whether he believed Judge Kavanaugh’s denials that he sexually assaulted Dr. Christine Blasey Ford in high school, Flake quietly repeated, “thank you, thank you,” as his staff attempted to pull him away.

“Saying ‘thank you’ is not an answer,” the first woman said, as Flake stood silent.

The whole scene was horrible, anguished, and a pretty good summation of how Senate Republicans see women.