Fmr. Reps. Claudine Schneider and Susan Molinari: We are Devastated to See Violence against Women Take Center Stage at the RNC

By Former Republican Representatives Claudine Schneider and Susan Molinari

Violence against women, like all violence, is never acceptable. While both political parties have ‘said’ we have to bring down the temperature in political discourse, evidently such empty pledges fall short when it comes to the GOP and women.

The GOP is not only refusing to rebuke violence but elevating those who raised a hand to a woman.

In an attempt to appeal to male voters and lean into full toxic masculinity, Dana White, the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) CEO and longtime friend of the former president, introduced former President Donald Trump on Thursday at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.

Women voters and the men who respect their mothers, wives, daughters, friends, and coworkers should be aware that White has been seen on video slapping his wife. Instead of denouncing spousal abuse as unacceptable, the Republican Party has decided to highlight it and make machismo a feature.

Domestic abuse is a pattern of coercive control and abusive behavior used to gain or maintain power and control over an intimate partner. The abuse can be physical, sexual, emotional, economic, or psychological actions. Domestic abuse can happen to anyone of any race, age, sexual orientation, religion, or gender and affects people of all socioeconomic backgrounds and education levels.

The statistics of domestic abuse are staggering. In domestic violence homicides, women are six times more likely to be killed when a gun is in the house. More than 1 in 3 women (35.6%)  in the U.S. will experience rape, physical violence, and/or stalking by an intimate partner in their lifetime. Nearly 20 people are physically abused by an intimate partner each minute in the U.S which adds to more than 10 million women and men experiencing domestic violence each year.

The idea of having White introduce Trump at the nominating convention should come as no surprise. This iteration of the GOP has been attacking women and their rights for some time now.

No one should forget the infamous 2005 Access Hollywood tape when Trump bragged in vulgar terms about kissing, groping, and trying to have sex with women saying that “when you’re a star, they let you do it.”

Trump is an adjudicated sexual assaulter after a jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll in 1996 and later a separate jury awarded Carroll an additional $83.3 million for his continued defamation attacks on her.

During the 2016 campaign, more than a dozen women came forward and attested they had been sexually accosted by Trump.

While addressing a Christian high school in Southern California in 2021, Trump’s running mate Sen. JD Vance has said that people should continue to stay in marriages — including the ones that are “violent” — for the sake of children otherwise it would make it “easier for people to shift spouses like they change their underwear.”

As a senator, Vance said he supports a nationwide ban on abortion and opposes exceptions for rape and incest survivors – saying “two wrongs don’t make a right” and calling those circumstances “inconvenient.”

Conservatives have already been dictating what we can or cannot do with our bodies and with our families, especially since the 2022 U.S. Supreme Court Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision which reversed Roe v. Wade, saying that The Constitution of the United States does not confer a right to abortion.

Forty-seven Republican senators, including Vance, voted against a bill that would protect and expand nationwide access to fertility treatment, including in vitro fertilization.

The term “toxic masculinity” is labeled toxic for a reason. It can have negative effects on women and on society as a whole and is socially destructive. This type of administration would set women back for decades.

We have not worked as hard as we have to give our rights away freely. That is why we Republican women and former Republican women cannot endorse a Trump-Vance ticket and robustly reject the embrace of abusers.

Republican former Members of Congress Claudine Schneider represented Rhode Island from 1981-1991 and Susan Molinari represented New York from 1990-1997.