When I returned to the chamber, there were rumblings. It appeared that Senator Flake had been affected by the survivors who’d stopped him in the elevator on the way to the hearing that morning. After consultation with Senator Chris Coons, a Democrat from Delaware, and others, Senator Flake called for a delay to the final vote so the FBI could be given a week to investigate further. It gave us an unexpected reprieve.
We know now that the victory felt in that moment was fleeting—but that does not diminish its significance. Two survivors of sexual assault standing in front of an elevator seemed to change the mind of a senator whom most saw as immovable, securing an FBI investigation and forcing a delay in an out-of-control process. In that moment, those two brave women were more powerful than all the Democratic senators on the Judiciary Committee. Together they paused history—and gave us one last chance to prevail.
But the White House had one more card to play. The administration limited the scope of the investigation, dictating whom the FBI could speak to, even preventing agents from following up with Dr. Ford and Judge Kavanaugh themselves. And yet for key swing senators, the fact that there had been an investigation of any kind was enough. On October 6, 2018, I stood on the Senate floor and watched as Judge Kavanaugh got confirmed.
I have been writing these words in the days since, even as I finish this manuscript. Like many Americans, I am still processing what our country has just been through. But for now, I will say this: It would be a mistake to downplay the consequences of having Justice Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court. With this lifetime appointment, he will be in a position, along with the conservative majority on the court, to end a woman’s right to choose as we know it; to invalidate the Affordable Care Act; to undo the legal basis by which corporations are regulated; to unravel fundamental rights to vote, to marry, and to privacy.
I worry about the ways his partisanship and temperament will infect the court, how it will color his decision making, how it will disadvantage so many who seek relief in the courts. I worry about what it will do to the court itself to have a man credibly accused of sexual assault among its justices. I worry about the message that has been sent yet again to Americans and the world: that in our country, today, someone can rage, lash out, resist accountability, and still ascend to a position of extraordinary power over other people’s lives.
But here’s what I am not worried about: I am not worried about our commitment to the fight for a better country. I am not worried that this experience has diminished our will. We chose this fight not because we were sure we could win but because we were sure it was right. Because that should be all that matters. And I know it is no bromide of consolation to say what is certainly true: that even though we didn’t prevail, this fight mattered.
Dr. Ford did not come forward in vain. As Senator Patrick Leahy said of her decision to speak, “Bravery is contagious.” The cameras and microphones that Dr. Ford never sought carried her story and her message far beyond our committee room, inspiring women and men to tell the stories of their sexual assaults, many for the first time. On the day that Dr. Ford testified, the National Sexual Assault Hotline saw a 200 percent increase in calls. Women were calling in to C-SPAN to share their stories. Writing op-eds. Telling their husbands and fathers. They were speaking their truth—and, in so doing, making plainer than ever the pervasiveness of sexual violence.
These survivors took no pleasure in reliving their own pain. Many who came forward had no intention of seeking justice, much less an expectation of receiving it. But they spoke out, like the survivors of Harvey Weinstein, Larry Nassar, and Bill Cosby, like survivors of abuse in the Catholic Church, to help ensure that this conversation will never again be limited to whispers. Sexual violence is real. It is wrong. It affects men as well as women. And no one should suffer in silence. The faces, the voices, the crowds who filled the hearing room and the Hart Building and the streets outside the Supreme Court, the people who flooded social media with messages of solidarity and shared anguish, all command us to listen, to respect, to believe, and to act. Their voices, like Dr. Ford’s, will have lasting reach.
Indeed, though this battle is over, the scope of its impact is yet to be seen. History has shown that one person’s willingness to stand up for what is right can be the spark that ignites far-reaching change. Anita Hill’s testimony wasn’t enough to keep Clarence Thomas off the Supreme Court in 1991, but it brought the term “sexual harassment” into the mainstream and started a national conversation. Less than two months after Hill’s testimony, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1991, which expanded the remedies available to victims of sexual harassment. The following year, Democratic women took the 1992 elections by storm, doubling the number of women in the House and tripling the number of women in the Senate.
I am not naive. I walk the same halls where one Republican senator told survivors of sexual assault to “grow up,” and where another described protesting survivors as a “mob,” even as the president he serves was inciting a crowd to humiliate Dr. Ford. I know—we all know—that there are miles still to go before women are accorded the full respect and dignity we deserve. But I am heartened by the unprecedented numbers of women running for office, and the many more who have been politically energized. I am heartened by the new bonds being forged across boundaries of race, age, background, experience, and gender as women and men stand shoulder to shoulder for justice, equality, and basic rights.
This progress is the product of a movement. A movement that started before Anita Hill ever testified and will continue long after Dr. Ford becomes a hero in our children’s history books. We will grow stronger through every effort, even when we face setbacks. We will draw wisdom from every chapter, even when those lessons are hard. We will face what is to come with conviction that change is possible—knowing that truth is like the sun. It always rises.
YOU MAY BE THE FIRST.
DON’T BE THE LAST.
I was in the middle of my first campaign for district attorney when I got a call from an old law school friend, Lisa, who was working as a career counselor at a nearby law school. She had met a young black woman named Venus Johnson, a second-year law student who had grown up in Oakland, the child of an immigrant, with dreams of becoming a prosecutor. Not surprisingly, when my friend heard Venus’s story, she thought of me.
We arranged to spend a day together in the fall of 2003, and from the moment I shook Venus’s hand, I could feel this incredible sense of commonality. I could see myself in her. She was kind enough to spend the day following me around while I campaigned and ran errands. At one point, we ended up shopping for a wedding present for one of my dear friends. (I settled on bedding.) At another, we drove past a storefront that had a sign for my opponent in the window.
“Come on, let’s go,” I told Venus as I grabbed one of my own signs out of the trunk. We went in and I shook hands with the store owner and asked him for his support.
“But . . . um . . . I have another candidate’s sign in my window,” he said, not sure what to make of me. “That’s okay,” I told him. “You can put mine in the window, too!” He agreed, and we were on our way.
Over lunch, Venus and I talked about the reasons she wanted to be a prosecutor, and the kind of work she had hoped to do. I learned that her father had a long career in law enforcement, and that she always imagined herself fighting on behalf of victims. I told her that I had taken a similar path and recommended she follow her instincts and join the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office. I’d be happy, I told her, to make some calls on her behalf.
She seemed to wonder why I was doing this for her. I told her that there was something my mother used to say that I always held close. “You may be the first. Don’t be the last.” My mother had gotten to where she was because of the help of mentors. I had gotten to where I was because of mentors, too. And I intended to be a mentor to as many people as I could during the course of my career.
A
few years after my first conversation with Venus, she got the job she’d been dreaming of in the Alameda County DA’s Office. She worked there for eight years, and, like me, she specialized in helping victims of sexual violence. We spoke regularly over those years. In 2014, she joined me in the attorney general’s office, and about one year into her working for me on legislative matters, I had a specific request for her.
I called her into my office. “I want you to be my associate attorney general and my de facto chief of staff.” There was a pregnant pause. “Me?” she asked. “Yes, you!” I’ve had a lot of good fortune in my life, but I’m not sure I’ve ever felt as lucky as the moment she said yes. She was as wonderful at the job as I thought she would be. In addition to keeping things moving, staffing me, and being the last person in line to ensure that I was prepared for meetings and press conferences, she helped to manage a complex bureaucracy and lead major initiatives on my behalf as a legal and policy adviser. I couldn’t have asked for a better member of the team.
During those years, we spent a lot of time together. We’ve continued to speak since our time in the attorney general’s office. Sometimes about her cases. Sometimes about career moves she was considering. Once about a recipe for a really amazing chicken broth.
Venus was part of the inspiration for a speech I often give, especially in front of groups of young women. I like to induct them into what I call the Role Models Club.
I tell them that, whatever profession they choose, they’ve got to keep raising their hands, to share—and take credit for—their good ideas, and to know that they deserve to rise as high as they dare to climb. I also tell them that when they see others in need, they’ve got to go out of their way to lift them up.
I tell them that sometimes members of the Role Models Club can feel alone. Sometimes they may think, “Do I have to carry this burden by myself?” The fact is, they will find themselves in rooms where no one else looks like them. And breaking barriers can be scary. When you break through a glass ceiling, you’re going to get cut, and it’s going to hurt. It is not without pain. But I ask them to look around at one another and hold that image in their brains and their hearts and their souls. I tell them to remember that they are never in those rooms alone—that we are all in there with them, cheering them on. And so when they stand up, when they speak out, when they express their thoughts and feelings, they should know that we’re right there in that room with them and we’ve got their back. I know Venus always has mine.
* * *
• • •
I’ve seen a lot in my years of public service. And what I’ve learned can’t all be boiled down. But I’ve come away with the firm belief that people are fundamentally good. And that, given the chance, they will usually reach out a hand to help their neighbor.
I’ve learned, through history and experience, that not all progress is gradual or linear. Sometimes it simply goes from one plateau to another. Sometimes we fall back tragically. Sometimes we leap forward and achieve things beyond the realm of what we thought possible. I believe that our job is to provide the force propulsion that will get us to a higher plane.
We have yet to achieve that perfect union. Alongside the great achievements of the American experiment lies a dark history that we have to deal with in the present. In the face of powerful headwinds, it’s easy to become tired. To become overwhelmed. But we cannot give up. The beginning of our downfall comes when we stop aspiring.
Let me speak one final truth: For all of our differences, for all the battles, for all the fights, we are still one American family, and we should act like it. We have so much more in common than what separates us. We need to paint a picture of the future in which everyone can see themselves, and everyone is seen. A vibrant portrait of a vibrant United States, where everyone is treated with equal dignity and each of us has the opportunities to make the most of our own lives. That is the vision worth fighting for, born out of love of country.
It is an age-old fight. And what we know about it is this: Victories won can be lost in complacency. Battles lost can be won with new effort. Every generation has to recommit to the work, to the effort, and to the true meaning of the word “patriot.” A patriot is not someone who condones the conduct of our country, whatever it does; it is someone who fights every day for the ideals of the country, whatever it takes.
What I have seen, especially since becoming a United States senator, is that this is a fight born out of optimism, too. I see hundreds of Dreamers walking the halls of the Capitol who believe that if they are heard, they can make a difference. And they will. I see it in the parents who traveled from all over the country to Washington with their disabled children, to show Congress the faces of those who would lose coverage if the Affordable Care Act was repealed. I see it in the women who fight every day for the right to make their own decisions about their bodies. I see it in the Parkland survivors, who march and fight and organize for gun safety laws, and who have achieved significant victories that tell them a better future is possible.
When I travel our country, I see that optimism in the eyes of five- and seven- and ten-year-olds who feel a sense of purpose in being part of the fight. I see it, and feel it, in the energy of the people I meet. Yes, people are marching. Yes, people are shouting. But they are doing it from a place of optimism. That’s why they’ve got their babies with them. That’s why my parents took me in a stroller to civil rights marches. Because as overwhelming as the circumstances may be, they believe, as I do, that a better future is possible for us all.
My daily challenge to myself is to be part of the solution, to be a joyful warrior in the battle to come. My challenge to you is to join that effort. To stand up for our ideals and our values. Let’s not throw up our hands when it’s time to roll up our sleeves. Not now. Not tomorrow. Not ever.
Years from now, our children and our grandchildren will look up and lock eyes with us. They will ask us where we were when the stakes were so high. They will ask us what it was like. I don’t want us to just tell them how we felt. I want us to tell them what we did.
My parents met at Berkeley during the civil rights movement. They were married soon after.
My mother and her dear friend Auntie Lenore were part of the protests against Birmingham atrocities.
At twenty-five years old, Mommy had a college degree, a PhD, and me.
Proud daddy on his way to a doctorate in economics at Berkeley. (April 1965)
When I was ten months old, I visited Spanish Town, Jamaica. This is me with my mother and my paternal grandfather, Oscar Joseph.
With my great grandmother Iris Finegan in Jamaica.
Visiting my uncle Freddy in Harlem. Harlem was always a magical place for me. (September 1966)
Couldn’t have been more excited to welcome my baby sister, Maya. (March 1967)
Grandpa and me when we visited him and my grandmother in Lusaka, Zambia. He was sent on a diplomatic mission by India to assist the African nation when it gained independence. Grandpa was one of my favorite people in the world and one of the earliest and most lasting influences in my life.
Christmas 1968. Sisters waiting for Santa Claus.
Mommy, Maya, and me outside of our apartment on Milvia Street after my parents separated. From then on, we were known as Shyamala and the girls. (January 1970)
Sporting my ’fro. (Summer of 1970)
My class at Thousand Oaks Elementary School was only the second in Berkeley to be integrated. This is Mrs. Wilson’s first grade. That’s me in the middle, in the white sweater.
This is my sixth birthday party. Included in this photo is Stacey Johnson, my best friend in kindergarten and still one of my closest friends today.
Maya and me at Madam Bovie’s Ballet Studio. I loved dancing as a child. I still do.
My favorite pleather
jacket at age seven. (December 1971)
Hanging out with my family in Jamaica. Maya is off to the right.
My maternal grandparents came to visit in 1972. You can see my mom’s yellow Dodge Dart to the left. We lived just up those stairs, above the nursery school.
Long before “take your kid to work day,” my mother often took us to her lab in Berkeley. She had two goals in life: to raise her two daughters and to end breast cancer.
This is Maya and me in the front yard of our building. You can see the Bancroft Nursery sign just behind us. We lived upstairs.
My mother always said to me, “Kamala, you may be the first to do many things. Make sure you’re not the last.”
In front of Mrs. Shelton’s house, holding her granddaughter Saniyyah. The house was always full of children, good cooking, and lots of love. (Summer 1978)
During my freshman year at Howard University, almost every weekend was spent at the Mall protesting apartheid and calling for divestment. Here I am with Gwen Whitfield. (November 1982)
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