We spoke to co-organizer Jodeen Olguín-Tayler about why it was important to bring together a multiracial group of women—including sexual assault survivors—to protest the Republican presidential nominee.
“At virtually every dinner table this weekend, people talked about what should happen to Donald Trump’s political ambitions. But little consideration was given to what impact the brutish behavior he claimed to have had on the women he victimized.”
“It’s interesting because it’s coming out the same time the film’s coming out,” said Belafonte of the renewed attention to Parker and Jean Celestin’s 1999 rape trial.
Revived focus on a 17-year-old sexual assault case involving Parker and his “The Birth of a Nation” co-writer Jean Celestin—and the revelation that their accuser took her own life in 2012—has initiated a public conversation about rape and race.
