Protesters greet GOP Sen. Jeff Flake in Boston, urge him to vote against confirming Kavanaugh

Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) was in Boston on Monday for the Forbes Under 30 summit, and before the event, more than 1,500 protesters rallied in the streets, calling on him to vote "no" should the full Senate vote on the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

Congressional candidates Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York both spoke to the crowd, with Pressley, a member of the Boston City Council, sharing that when she was a student at Boston University, she was raped. Pressley said she is "angry" and "outraged" over the protection Kavanaugh has received from Republican lawmakers since Christine Blasey Ford and Deborah Ramirez both accused him of sexual assault; after Ford testified in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee last week, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said the hearing was "a charade."

"There were men in positions of power, of privilege, and prestige who described those proceedings as a disgrace to our nation, when the real disgrace is a tolerance of rape culture," Pressley said. Ocasio-Cortez echoed her sentiments, saying, "Sexual assault is about the abuse of power ... that is why a man believes that an elite education, a high income, and his rich friends can get away with sexual assault."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

As for Flake, he told the audience at the summit that it's important to have "more information, not less," and while he found Ford's testimony "compelling and credible," he described Kavanaugh's testimony as "an impassioned, raw defense." The Guardian reports that this comment earned Flake boos from the crowd.