More than 25 years after the dramatic showdown between Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill, the Senate Judiciary Committee has once again managed to mishandle a high-stakes confrontation between a male judicial nominee and his female accusers.
The infamous standoff between Thomas and Hill ignited a national discussion about sexual harassment in the workplace and opened a floodgate of sexual harassment cases. Over the last quarter century, courts and administrative agencies across the country have developed guidelines, procedures and standards for handling these cases in hopes of discovering truth, eliminating harassment in the workplace, and achieving justice.
Unfortunately, the Senate Judiciary Committee’s handling of Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination largely ignored these lessons.