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Hundreds of protesters, including comedian Amy Schumer, were arrested on Thursday after staging a stormy demonstration at the Hart Senate office building between Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, Supreme Court nominee and President Trump, on charges of sexual misconduct .
Among them were victims of sexual assault who, in many cases, had just started talking openly about what they had endured.
Several women and a man from Alaska, Arizona, Maine, and the District stood up in front of the pillars of the US Supreme Court earlier today to ask their senators one thing: faith.
"Believe us," they said. "Believe the survivors."
Their voices shook, their breathing accelerated. Some approached to hang on to someone next to them as they told a crowd of thousands: "I am a survivor".
The crowd recalled, "We believe you."
Actress Amy Schumer appears on the scene at a Supreme Court rally against candidate Brett Kavanaugh on Thursday, October 04, 2018 in Washington, DC (Matt McClain / The Washington Post).
A first Senate vote on Kavanaugh's appointment is scheduled for Friday, and a final vote could be held this weekend. Several other protests were scheduled for Thursday night and Friday in what the protesters described as their last chance to be heard. "
The event's organizers – including a march from the E. Barrett Prettyman courthouse from Constitution Avenue to the Supreme Court marches – had promised many daring names, including singer Alicia Keys and actress Maggie Gyllenhaal.
But Schumer and actor Emily Ratajkowski seemed to be the only celebrities at the protest.
"A vote for Kavanaugh is a vote that says women do not matter," Schumer told the crowd gathered in the Supreme Court. "No matter how it goes, they can not hold us back."
US Capitol police said they arrested 293 people for demonstrating illegally in the Hart building. While she was being taken away by officers, Schumer raised a fist and applauded as other women were picked up and taken away. Nine others were arrested for protesting in front of the Senate office building Dirksen.
Protesters from states as far away as Alaska said they went downtown this week to take to the streets – and to the offices of their senators. Three, in particular, seemed to be at the center of last-minute efforts to tip the vote of confirmation: the Senses. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) And Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), all of whom declined to indicate how they will vote.
Sarah Evans, 31, from Dillingham, Alaska, said she was scheduled to meet Murkowski with 135 of her Alaska compatriots late on Thursday afternoon.
Many of them had the intention of telling how they had been sexually assaulted.
"The state of Alaska has the highest rate of sexual assault in the country. I am a survivor myself. I do not know any women from Alaska who are not, "said Evans. "It was hard to watch what was going on (in Washington), so we wanted to come and make sure our stories were heard."
Susan Roth, 68, stood in the crowd, calmly raising her open palms. On her hands, she wrote at each age where she had been a victim of sexual misconduct.
It started, she said, at the age of 13.
"Last week, I was at a protest and I told people that it happened at the age of 15, but I thought about it – and I started to remember of all those other things that I had just let go – I realized it started at the age of 13, "Roth said. On his hands were of other ages: 15, 25, 27, 30.
"I would like our stories to make a difference," she said. "But I'm afraid it will not be the case."
On Thursday afternoon, Senator Heidi Heitkamp (ND), a Democrat in the red state whose vote had been called by the government, said she would vote against Kavanaugh.
Senator Joe Manchin III (West Virginia) remains the only undecided Democrat on the bid.
"November is coming," protesters chanted. "The survivors will remember it."
When confronted in the Hart Building, Manchin told a protester who had reproached him for not listening to the survivors: "I'm listening to you.
Challenging his claim that he refused to look into her eyes, he replied, "I look you right in the eye," before adding, "How do you know how I'm going to vote?
Manchin said he'd make his decision once he'd finish reading the report tomorrow morning.
Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) Praised the FBI's investigation of Kavanaugh's past as a fictitious investigation hampered by the White House.
"The survey was never designed to get to the bottom of things," she said. "This investigation was not thorough. This was not complete.
In the windows of senators' offices at the Hart Building, messages began to appear. They invoked Christine Blasey Ford, who accused Kavanaugh of having sexually assaulted her while they were in high school more than thirty years ago.
"We believe Dr. Ford," we read.
"I believe it," read another.
Ben Bergquam, who seemed to be one of the only counter-partners, had arrived from California by plane for the demonstration.
Bergquam, who runs his own organization called Frontline America, said he supported victims of sexual assault, but felt Democrats were using the real pain of survivors for political ends.
He spent much of the protest screaming at the speakers and arguing with the protesters shouting, "Do not be sexist. Do not believe women simply because they are women. "
Gabriel Pogrund contributed to this report.
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