Michelle Obama delivered one of her most powerful, poignant and history-making speeches at a Hillary Clinton rally in New Hampshire this week.
The First Lady threw out her usual campaign format as she felt to not discuss Donald Trump’s now infamous “grab her by the pussy” comments as well as his ongoing misogyny would be “dishonest and disingenuous”.
Obama never directly referenced Trump in the speech, instead choosing to refer to him only as “a candidate”.
Trump was “actually bragging about sexually assaulting women,” she said. “I can’t believe that I’m saying that a candidate for president of the United States has bragged about sexually assaulting women. And I have to tell you that I can’t stop thinking about this. It has shaken me to my core in a way that I couldn’t have predicted.”
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“This is not something that we can ignore,” she continued. “This wasn’t just locker room banter.”
“This was a powerful individual speaking freely and openly about sexually predatory behavior and actually bragging about kissing and groping women, using language so obscene that many of us worry about our children hearing it when we turn on the TV.”
Speaking on the multiple women who have publicly accused the Presidential candidate of inappropriate conduct, she says she feels it personally.
“The shameful comments about our bodies. The disrespect of our ambitions and intellect. The belief that you can do anything you want to a woman. It is cruel. It’s frightening. And the truth is, it hurts.”
“It’s like that sick, sinking feeling you get when walking down the street minding your own business and some guy yells out over words about your body. Or when you see that guy at work that stands just a little too close, stress a little too long, and makes you feel uncomfortable in your own skin. It’s that feeling of terror and violation that too many women have felt when someone has grabbed them, or forced himself on him, and they’ve said no, but he didn’t listen.”
Expressing her sadness over the “hurtful, hateful language about women” throughout the campaign, she said it was “painful” to those who expected leaders should meet “basic standards of human decency.”
“Too many are treating this as just another day’s headline, as if our outrage is overblown or unwarranted. As if this is normal. Just politics as usual,” she continued.
“But New Hampshire, be clear: This is not normal, this is not politics as usual. This is disgraceful. It is intolerable.”
“Enough is enough,” she said. “This has got to stop right now.”
Source: CNN
