Democratic presidential candidate Kirsten Gillibrand accused other unnamed 2020 candidates of opposing women entering the workforce at a Friday campaign event.
Iowa political blog Iowa Startling Line first reported Gillibrand told an Iowa City crowd that "We have Democratic candidates running for president right now who do not believe necessarily that it's a good idea that women work outside the home. No joke."
"We have presidential candidates running right now who think the #MeToo movement has gone too far. What do you mean by that? Do you mean any woman who has come forward to say she has been sexually harassed or sexually assaulted shouldn't be complaining?" she continued.
When asked by the New York Times which candidates she was referring to, the Gillibrand campaign declined to name names. "Kirsten believes we need to have a broader and more intentional conversation about valuing women in this country and even this primary, and she intends to do so in the coming days," a spokeswoman said. "Stay tuned."
It's likely Gillibrand was referring obliquely to fellow presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren, who wrote a book called The Two-Income Trap suggesting that the rise in two-income middle class families had unintended side effects, including a rise in bankruptcy rates. Warren "frames the issue in some unusual and provocative ways that could end up hurting her with feminists" suggested Vox's Matthew Yglesias.
Gillibrand's defense of the #MeToo movement comes after a recent New Yorker piece arguing that the effort to oust Senator Al Franken (D., Minn.) after eight women made allegations of unwanted touching and kissing was misguided. Gillibrand, one of the first Democrats to call for Franken's resignation, trashed the article, arguing the report focused only on one woman and that "there was really no critical or investigative journalism or reporting on the other seven, and that certainly causes me pause."