This has been one of America’s worst weeks.

As the country continues dealing with a raging pandemic that is killing, on average, 2,700 people per day, and an economic fallout that has cost millions their jobs — and disproportionately impacted women, who are still suffering through the country’s first female recession — we collectively witnessed an insurrection that threatened the peaceful transition of power. It was led by thousands of Trump-supporting rioters, most of them White men, who invaded the Capitol on Wednesday in the first breach of the building since 1812.

The election has been decided. Not just by the majority of the American electorate, who voted to instate Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in the White House, but by secretaries of state who counted and recounted the ballots and judges across the country who ruled in court cases to uphold these results.

And yet, President Donald Trump has undermined these facts with weeks of baseless accusations of election fraud. It’s unsurprising that the culmination of his rhetoric led supporters to descend on the Capitol building, where they used intimidation tactics and violence to try to cow Congress into overturning the results. 

At The 19th, we watched the footage coming out of our nation’s capital with the same horror, confusion and despair as many of our readers. We feared for our democracy. We feared for our fellow journalists bravely working to inform the public on what was unfolding. And we quickly turned to our social platforms and website to bring our readers as much reliable, verified information as we could. 

We witnessed women at all levels jump to action, from the swift-thinking aides who ferried the Electoral College votes to safety to the lawmakers who called for impeachment of the president. But we most closely followed how legislators reacted in this pivotal moment in American history. Ahead of the insurrection, we noted that at least 23 Republican congresswomen had publicly declared they would not vote to certify the presidential election results, putting them in lockstep with the president’s baseless accusations that there was election meddling to be investigated. 

One of those women was Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who made her announcement on the eve of her own runoff election in Georgia. 

But then she lost her election. She returned to Washington, and she was met with insurrectionists at the door. After Congress reconvened, she stood on the Senate floor, and publicly and conveniently changed her tune. “When I arrived in Washington this morning I fully intended to object to the certification of the electoral votes,” she said. “However, the events that have transpired today have forced me to reconsider, and I cannot, now, in good conscience, object to the certification.” 

Some might say it’s laudable she reconsidered; many of her colleagues did not. I’m cynical — at best. When she was hoping for a win, Loeffler tied herself to a president who barely helped her in her own campaign efforts and was reportedly happy she and David Perdue lost. And when she lost that election and no longer felt beholden to the president and his base? It’s not hard to wonder if that made it easier for her to find that “conscience” and vote to certify. 

Ultimately, 19 Republican congresswomen still opposed the certification — including more than half of the Republican women in the U.S. House — even after a mob looted and destroyed their offices and the peoples’ house.  

It’s a grim period in American history to know that a disruption of democracy is met not with forceful defiance of an outgoing president who instigated an act that some are calling sedition, but with fealty to baseless accusations — all in the name of politics. 

How far will Americans and our elected officials go to test our democracy? And how do we guard against further erosion of our founding principles? I don’t have the answer to either of those questions. But at The 19th, we will continue to spotlight those who respect and further the democratic process — and unwaveringly hold to account those who don’t.


Andrea Valdez
Editor in chief, The 19th

Ten years ago, on January 8, 2011, Democratic Rep. Gabby Giffords of Arizona was meeting with a group of constituents in a Tucson-area supermarket parking lot when a 22-year-old man with a semiautomatic pistol opened fire on the group of roughly 25. He killed six and injured 13, including Giffords, who was shot in the head.

Giffords was critically injured — some media outlets initially reported she had died at the scene — and put in a medically induced coma. Later that month, she began basic physical therapy. In January of the next year, she resigned from the House of Representatives to focus on her recovery. 

In January 2013, just weeks after an armed 20-year-old man killed 20 young children and six staff members at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, Giffords and her husband, Mark Kelly, started Americans for Responsible Solutions, a political action committee that supported candidates who backed new gun safety laws. 

In a recent interview with The 19th, Giffords, who served in the Arizona statehouse before her election to Congress, reflected on her work to reduce gun violence, her recovery and the prospects for passing gun safety measures.

Read Amanda Becker’s full interview with Gabby Giffords here.