Political Quotes

“I rise in strong support of the Military Justice Improvement Act. I am so proud to stand with 17 of the 20 women Members of this Senate on both sides of the aisle and with a large number of colleagues from both sides--a majority--to fight for real change in the way our military addresses the epidemic of military sexual assault. When one is in Washington for a while--and I have been in Washington for a while. Thanks to the good people of California, I was elected to the House in 1982 and took my seat in 1983. I have seen this issue get worse and worse. The issue of sexual assault in the military is not new. Unfortunately, it is decades old. It was 23 years ago that dozens of women and men were sexually harassed and assaulted in the halls of a Las Vegas hotel during the Tailhook Association's annual convention. The 1991 Tailhook scandal focused a national spotlight on the issue of military sexual assault, and then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney declared after it was over a zero tolerance policy. I have to be completely blunt with everybody who may be listening to this. The fact is, after Tailhook and all of these promises from everybody, I thought we would never see this epidemic grow as it has. I thought we stopped the epidemic of sexual assault in the military because it was heinous to see what they did when everyone said it would be over. Let's take a look at how many Secretaries of Defense made a pledge. We will start from the bottom and work our way up to the top.…”