The deliberation on Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, which has rocked the country for the past month, has made its way to Georgia State’s campus.
The already hyper-partisan nomination came to a head last week as Dr. Christine Blasey Ford testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee about her alleged assault by Kavanaugh. In total, three accusations of assault throughout Kavanaugh’s high school and college career have surfaced.
On Thursday, Oct. 4, protests in opposition to Kavanaugh sprouted across the nation, including in our own Library Plaza.
Campus demonstrations, organized by the International Socialist Organization, began at 4 p.m. with emphatic chants of “F— Kavanaugh! F— sexual assault!” After an assembly in the Library Plaza, protestors marched around the State Capitol before returning to campus.
Demonstrators in attendance said they fear that after a seemingly limited FBI investigation into the allegations, the inevitable nomination of Kavanaugh is just around the corner.
“It seemed like it was very restricted in terms of its layout. The FBI’s hands are tied [by the Trump administration]. They can’t do much,” Tom Gagné, a 2016 graduate of Georgia State, said.
For some senators, the week-long FBI investigation only reaffirmed Kavanaugh’s perceived innocence. For others, it made them question its legitimacy.
“If that’s an investigation, that’s a bull—- investigation. The reality is that is not a full and thorough investigation,” Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) said on Thursday.
Senators Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), two of the most critical swing votes in the confirmation process, signaled that they were satisfied with the investigation.
But Dr. Ford has stood resolute in her recollection of what happened that night in 1982, and thousands of Americans took the streets today in support of her.
Ebony Short, a senior at Georgia State, said that in order to make a difference, society must demand change.
“The overarching system that perpetuates all of these systems of domination, transphobia, queerphobia, racism, sexism—it’s capitalism. So, we have to work towards dismantling that.”
The International Socialist Organization passed out flyers for a public meeting and discussion on winning the battle against rape culture on Oct. 9, but as Kavanaugh inches closer to a seat on the bench, the future of the country may already be decided.
And if Kavanaugh’s nomination is indeed to be confirmed this weekend, the message it sends couldn’t be more clear to student Monica Bwalya.
“I think it’s a big ‘f— you’ to all the women—to every woman.”
The ISO was one of the key organizing groups, but so were the Panthers for Black Feminism and Planned Parenthood Generation Action, and many others helped with publicity.