Trump symbolized powerful men’s impunity for sexual abuse –until now | Moira Donegan

At stake in E Jean Carroll's lawsuit was not whether she would be believed but whether it would matter. Finally, it did

It's been nearly seven years since the nation heard Donald Trump bragging on tape to Access Hollywood's Billy Bush about his habit for sexually assaulting women. It's been seven years since the Republican presidential candidate shrugged off the remark as locker room talk" - classifying sexual abuse as private, unserious, a prerogative of what he still claimed, then at 70 years old, was his boyish playfulness. It's been seven years since he won the presidency anyway - a historic humiliation of women that affirmed powerful men's impunity for sexual abuse, and portrayed Trump's boorish hostility to women's dignity as compatible with the solemnity of presidential power. It's been just over six years since those women poured into the streets in defiant declaration of their own citizenship at the Women's March, and six years since a wave of anger at the rampant and habitual sexual abuse of women by men exploded into the #MeToo movement.

But it took a New York jury less than three hours to unanimously agree that Donald Trump sexually abused the writer E Jean Carroll in a dressing room at a Manhattan department store in the mid-90s, and then defamed her when he said she was lying about it. When the verdict came down, it felt like letting out a breath you didn't know you were holding.

Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organisations. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 500 2222. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html.