Writer and artist Courtney Privett was reading the news on Wednesday as she prepared breakfast for her two daughters, 2 and 5 years old.
Like many around the country, she’d already learned how Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) cut off Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) as she tried to read a 1986 letter written by Coretta Scott King about Senator Jeff Sessions, who was nominated by President Donald Trump to serve as attorney general.
“Sen. Warren was giving a lengthy speech,” McConnell said later. “She had appeared to violate the rule. She was warned. She was given an explanation. Nevertheless, she persisted.”
It didn’t take long for those final two words to gain traction around the internet, becoming a rallying cry for all the women who had spent their lives being judged, objectified, condescended to, ignored, silenced, attacked and, yes, “warned.” Women who, nevertheless, persisted.