Vice President Joe Biden said Tuesday that alcohol is never an excuse for violence against women, a week after the nation was outraged after a Stanford University student was sentenced to just six months in jail after sexually assaulting a woman.

Biden said in a speech at the United State of Women Summit hosted by the White House that just because a woman doesn’t verbally protest doesn’t mean consent, “and if you cannot consent because you are unconscious, it is rape. It is rape. Period.”