Powerful men were punished last week. To be sure, the stories of Congressmen Al Franken and John Conyers—which themselves differ significantly from one another, primarily in that only the latter appears to have harassed his own employees—share essentially nothing other than the timing of their denouements with those of the two men I will discuss below who were convicted of serious and heinous crimes. Based on the allegations thus far, the two Democrats will almost certainly not face actual criminal charges for their highly inappropriate and fundamentally unacceptable behavior. Additionally, Republican Rep. Trent Franks also resigned last week after admitting to having had inappropriate sexual conversations with two staffers. We’ll see what happens to another Republican who settled a sexual harassment case—the payout came from taxpayer dollars, no less—Rep. Blake Farenthold of Texas.
As for the two criminals, a South Carolina judge sentenced former North Charleston police officer Michael Slager to 20 years in prison. He was convicted on one count of second-degree murder for shooting to death Walter Scott, who was unarmed and running away from him. Slager was also convicted of obstruction of justice for planting his Taser near his victim’s body, in a blatant attempt to make it appear he had reason to fear for his life, and thus that his murder of Scott was justifiable.
The murder of Walter Scott reflects an all-too-common reality for African-Americans, namely that they are disproportionately likely to face abuse or other unjustifiable violence at the hands of police. What has not been all too common has been convictions and significant jail time for the perpetrators after police officers kill unarmed black men. One conviction is just that—one, and even that one likely wouldn’t have happened without video evidence of both the crime and attempted cover-up. But it is a positive step. A more positive one on this issue, of course, would be a drop in the number of police killings. If Europe can achieve this, why can’t we?
The second criminal going to jail is Oliver Schmidt. He’s facing a seven-year sentence for his role in the Volkswagen emissions cheating scandal (another VW employee will serve 40 months after also pleading guilty in August and cooperating with law enforcement). In a brazen attempt to subvert laws that protect our environment, that company engaged in a wide-ranging conspiracy centering around the installation of software that was able to not only know when a vehicle was being tested, but also falsify its environmental impact during the test. In other words, Schmidt helped Volkswagen pollute and get away with it.
Last week saw real victories on matters of racial and environmental justice. My hope is that these victories do more than just punish these particular criminals: that they prevent future crimes by putting the fear of jail into those who would commit them. Furthermore, whatever one thinks of what happened to Franken and Conyers (and Franks, for that matter), my hope is that their fates will make more powerful people think twice before possibly crossing the line of sexual harassment or worse.
Despite the profound differences among them, the downfall of these five men all reflect wrongdoers being held accountable for their behavior. But that was last week.
Now let’s talk about this week.
It’s not worth revisiting the debate over whether either Sen. Franken or Rep. Conyers should have resigned, or whether their fellow Democrats should have demanded their resignations. What matters is what happens next. And Franken himself put the focus in exactly the right place:
I, of all people, am aware that there is some irony in the fact that I am leaving while a man who has bragged on tape about his history of sexual assault sits in the Oval Office, and a man who has repeatedly preyed on young girls campaigns for the Senate with the full support of his party.
Over the same period that saw the fall of Conyers and Franken, Donald Trump endorsed Republican Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore. And if the first endorsement wasn’t good enough, he did it again on Friday. Mitch McConnell has shown how spineless he is by pulling back his previous, strong condemnation of Moore made last month, in which he demanded Moore quit his Senate bid. How about now? Well, you can see what he said for yourself:
The Republican Party as an institution, led by Trump, is—at least since 2016 and even more so now—on record as the party that is willing to overlook credible accusations of sexual harassment, assault, and even pedophilia if it means winning an election. That fact requires no further commentary.
We’ll find out soon enough if the voters of Alabama are going to reward Roy Moore or hold him accountable by electing Doug Jones to the Senate. On a related note, we saw earlier this year that assaulting a journalist trying to do his job wasn’t enough to stop Montanans from electing Republican Greg Gianforte—who pled guilty—to Congress, nor has that assault led to any calls from members of his party that he resign. Why exactly is this assault—an act of physical violence, mind you—not a serious enough crime to bring Gianforte’s political career to an end?
The announcements by Conyers and Franken that they would be leaving Congress brought an end to the careers of two men who fought hard for progressive issues. That makes their end, for me and I suspect for most progressives, all the more tragic. Most progressives go into politics to advance the causes they believe in. We assume the same is true for most conservatives, although who knows what Donald Trump actually believes about policy on any given day—let’s see how Mr. “No cuts to Social Security, Medicare & Medicaid” handles Paul Ryan’s push to gut those programs next year to pay for the Trump (family) tax cuts.
The point is that if you could guarantee John Conyers and Al Franken that their resignations would help defeat the prancing pedophile Roy Moore this Tuesday, and ultimately help defeat the pussy-grabber-in-chief, there’s no doubt in my mind they would take that deal. There are no such guarantees of course, so all we can do is do what we can to win this Tuesday, in 2018, and in 2020, and give progressives the authority to make America a better, stronger, and more just country.
Ian Reifowitz is the author of Obama’s America: A Transformative Vision of Our National Identity (Potomac Books).