Vermont now prohibits employment agreements preventing an employee from disclosing sexual harassment, extends sexual harassment protections to independent contractors and allows auditing workplaces for compliance. USA TODAY found only two bills at the state level that passed in the past year that address two or more recommendations. Statutes of limitations, the cut-off date for filing criminal or civil charges. Pennsylvania's statute of limitations allowed Andrea Constand to file charges against Bill Cosby, now convicted, though other accusers were unable due to length of time.Uber and Lyft, for example, announced in May they no longer will require people alleging sexual assault against their drivers to take their claims to forced arbitration. Forced arbitration, or requirements in employment contracts to handle legal disputes through private systems rather than public courts.NDAs were used by Weinstein, for example. Non-disclosure agreements and other measures that prohibit transparency.They also propose eliminating or limiting: These included bolstering mandatory reporting and victim restitution and covering all workers under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits employment discrimination based on sex (domestic workers, for example, often fall outside those protections). Lois Frankel (D-Fla.) in April, proposing nine legislative or policy changes. If elected officials want to enshrine #MeToo reforms into law, they would ensure support services for survivors – including access to forensic nurses – and would end the backlog of untested DNA evidence, according to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, which runs the National Sexual Assault Hotline (80).Ī half-dozen advocacy groups sponsored Enough is Enough, an anti-sexual violence summit and congressional briefing hosted by Rep. More: Gretchen Carlson: To succeed, #MeToo must target America's laws, not just a few powerful men What would change look like? More: First-hand accounts from 8 Hollywood professionals hoping for change “Nobody will disagree something needs to be done, but the devil’s in the details.” But it hasn’t,” says Carol Moody, president of women’s advocacy group Legal Momentum. “Everybody thinks some massive, massive change in laws has happened with the #MeToo movement. Others, like a pair of California bills aimed at making it easier to take sexual harassment complaints to court, were vetoed. States have passed a number of laws, but the majority are limited in scope. But a closer analysis reveals few new laws that substantially remove the barriers for victims to report and seek justice or that increase accountability for perpetrators and employers.Ĭongress has passed no laws related to sexual harassment in the workplace since #MeToo, not even regarding its own handling of harassment and discrimination claims against senators and representatives, which lags behind the standard set by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) for private companies across the country. Elected officials across the country have held hearings and introduced resolutions and bills in support. #MeToo has raised awareness and made it easier for ongoing reform efforts to get traction. We found that since #MeToo began, elected officials passed 261 laws that directly addressed topics championed by the movement, just a slight uptick from the 238 in the year prior. USA TODAY examined more than 2,000 bills passed in the past 24 months by Congress and by legislatures in all 50 states that contained the word "sexual" and buzz terms such as "me too," "rape kits" and "nondisclosure" using the legislative tracking service LegiScan. Allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh have left an unprecedented number of Americans opposing his confirmation.īut in this year, activists' full-throated efforts haven't been matched by the elected officials who could pass laws to protect people from sexual misconduct in the workplace and beyond. Accused men, from Les Moonves to Al Franken, have been ousted from their positions of power. One year ago, allegations against Harvey Weinstein prompted a worldwide witnessing of sexual harassment and assault stories on social media, and the #MeToo movement sparked a cultural reckoning. Watch Video: How to combat sexual harassment in the workplace
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