Lois Frankel: “I thank my great colleague from California and I thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for their leadership on…”

“I thank my great colleague from California and I thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for their leadership on a subject of urgency. Mr. Speaker, in the strongest terms possible, I urge support of this bipartisan legislation called the PRIVATE Act that makes it illegal for military members to share explicit photos without consent. Our Democratic Working Women's Group recently held a bipartisan hearing regarding the Marine United Facebook page where male marines posted thousands of nude photos of female servicemembers and veterans without their consent. At this hearing, we heard the testimony of two courageous female marines whose privacy was violated with the nonconsensual posting of intimate photographs. They described their embarrassment, their anger, and the vitriolic harassment by their marine brothers that followed, with threats of rape and violence, and stomach-sickening posts like: ``We should throw female Marines into a tub of acid and rip off their eyelashes.'' Mr. Speaker, I am the proud mother of a United States Marine veteran, so I can tell you, I understand firsthand the selfless sacrifice a marine makes when he or she puts on their uniform.…”