10/09/2026
Bernadette Greene-Placentia, a candidate for Congress in Arizona, has shared publicly that she was sexually assaulted by two men late one night this summer while repairing campaign signs. She reported the assault, and the investigation is ongoing.
We honor her courage to share what happened and to fight back with the truth. We honor her bravery to keep running. We stand with Bernadette.
We are also deeply grateful to the family, staff, colleagues, and friends who noticed something was wrong, stayed with her through the agonizing stages of processing, and did everything they could, when they could, to make sure she was not alone. That is what safety as an ecosystem looks like. No woman should have to navigate violence or its aftermath alone.
What happened to Bernadette is not an isolated story. Women who run for and hold office face harassment, threats, and violence, much of it never reported and much of it carried alone. Sexual violence and political violence can have the same devastating consequences: making women afraid, silencing their voices, and pushing them out of public life or leaving them to carry extraordinary trauma while trying to serve their communities.
When violence silences women leaders, it also diminishes our democracy. We refuse to accept this as the cost of public service.
Candidates, elected officials, staff, and volunteers are doing this work in spaces that were never designed for us, often alone, often late, often unseen. Running for office should not require risking your safety. And being a woman in public life should never mean accepting violence as inevitable. That has to change, and it can.
We call on our community, our partners, and every institution that supports people in public life to:
- Believe survivors, and support them in coming forward on their own terms and their own timeline.
- Treat safety as essential, not optional. No solo field work at night. Check-in and check-out systems and clear plans for what happens if something goes wrong.
- Condemn sexual violence and political violence in every form, no matter who is targeted, and demand accountability for those responsible.
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