Last Friday, Vice President Kamala Harris spoke at the annual Clinton Global Initiative University meeting in partnership with Howard University. The conference covered a range of topics including democracy, environmental justice, systemic change, and COVID-19.
Harris spoke about women’s empowerment as well as COVID-19’s effect on women alongside former President Bill Clinton during a one-on-one session. The decision has stirred up controversy across the political spectrum. After all, Clinton was impeached for engaging in a sexual relationship with the intern Monica Lewinsky and then denying it.
Clinton also faces a multitude of sexual misconduct allegations from before his presidency that include rape and harrassment of women. He has been in the spotlight lately for his connections to Jeffery Epstein, taking an estimated 12 to 26 flights on Epstein’s private jet according to The New York Times.
One might expect the first female Vice President to refuse to speak with an individual whose alleged actions contradict the idea of women’s empowerment and the #MeToo movement. Many conservatives believe this decision represents the Vice President’s lack of morals.
During her presidential bid in 2019, Harris told reporters she believed allegations of sexual harassment against Joe Biden . Yet, she stopped calling attention to those allegations when she accepted his proposal to run for Vice President the following year.
Skylar Montaine-O’Brien, a sophomore at Miami and a proud feminist had a strong opinion on Harris’ decision to sit down with the controversial former President.
Believing the victims of Clinton’s alleged abuse, Montaine-O’Brien stated that Harris’ decision “is a slap in the face to the #MeToo movement” and that “Bill Clinton does not deserve the right to speak on something [women’s empowerment] that he has taken away from several women.”
Instead, Montaine-O’Brien believes that the conference should have hosted a sexual assault survivor or non-profit that supports survivors of sexual assault, women that have previously been “deprived of empowerment,” in place of Bill Clinton.
The American people often look to their leaders to show respectable values. Politicians who make their goal to climb the ladder and lack transparency struggle to earn the trust of the public. Kamala Harris’s decision to discuss female empowerment with a man who has harmed women has added to growing distrust in the new Vice President.
