Dr. Christine Blasey Ford Has Been Nominated for a Prestigious “Profile in Courage” Award

California Congresswoman Jackie Speier has nominated Dr. Christine Blasey Ford for the prestigious John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award. Previous recipients of the award include Barack Obama, Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, and Mitch Landrieu, the New Orleans mayor who called for the removal of the city’s Confederate monuments following the violent white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, North Carolina.

The award is designed “to honor President John F. Kennedy and to recognize and celebrate the quality of political courage that he admired most.”

Rep. Speier called Dr. Ford “a true American (s)hero who sacrificed so much to do what was right for our country and for the pursuit of truth of justice.”

Dr. Ford sacrificed her privacy and risked her personal security last year to testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee about the assault she says she experienced at the hands of now-Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. She recounted what must have been one of the most painful experiences of her life for both the Senate and a worldwide audience, knowing that she would be putting herself at risk by doing so.

Six weeks after her testimony and questioning, Dr. Ford said she was still receiving threats, had had to move a number of times, and she still hadn’t been able to return to her job as a professor at Palo Alto University. Still, she said at that time that “Although coming forward was terrifying, and caused disruption to our lives, I am grateful to have had the opportunity to fulfill my civic duty.”

The Profile in Courage Award is traditionally reserved for public servants, but Dr. Ford showed incredible personal and political courage. While Kavanaugh was still ultimately confirmed, Ford ignited a national conversation about sexual assault. She sacrificed her own well-being to speak truth to power and we’re grateful for that.

(via Twitter, image: WIN MCNAMEE/AFP/Getty Images)

Want more stories like this? Become a subscriber and support the site!

—The Mary Sue has a strict comment policy that forbids, but is not limited to, personal insults toward anyone, hate speech, and trolling.—

Have a tip we should know? tips@themarysue.com

Author

Close

Vivian Kane

Vivian Kane (she/her) is the Senior News Editor at The Mary Sue, where she's been writing about politics and entertainment (and all the ways in which the two overlap) since the dark days of late 2016. Born in San Francisco and radicalized in Los Angeles, she now lives in Kansas City, Missouri, where she gets to put her MFA to use covering the local theatre scene. She is the co-owner of The Pitch, Kansas City’s alt news and culture magazine, alongside her husband, Brock Wilbur, with whom she also shares many cats.

twitter