Feminist attorney Gloria Allred has a new target in her sights: the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.
She called a press conference Thursday outside of Camp Pendleton, Calif., to claim Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, is trying to hide the scope of the Marines United nude photo-sharing scandal that shook the U.S. military last month.
Allred, who represents alleged victims of the scandal, said she hand-delivered a request in March to Thornberry asking him to call public hearings so the women could testify. On Thursday, she had a response letter from the chairman, saying the Armed Services Committee was working on arranging a panel to testify but had some reservations.
“His response, in my opinion, is an attempt to hide from the public the true facts about how the system has failed to protect female Marines and how and why it is failing to promptly and fairly impose appropriate discipline and consequences on the perpetrators,” she said at the press conference, according to prepared remarks provided by her office.
For its part, the committee was uncertain why Allred was lobbing the criticism.
“We hope to have a victim panel as part of next week’s hearing and we are working with the minority to make that happen,” said Claude Chafin, a spokesman for the committee’s Republican majority.
In his response to Allred, Thornberry called the allegations in the Marines United case “disturbing” and said all troops should be treated with “dignity and respect,” sentiments he also echoed publicly.
The House Armed Services Committee has held a closed briefing with Marine Commandant Gen. Robert Neller and a hearing on social media policy since the military and particularly the Marine Corps were rocked by public revelations that photos of female troops, sometimes nude, were being posted and shared along with their personal information on social media sites.
However, the Senate chose to question Neller in a public hearing about the deep and persistent problems of sexism and sexual assault in the service, while the commandant briefed House lawmakers behind closed doors.
Thornberry and committee members have been reluctant to conduct hearings and victim testimony in public due to concerns it could be seen as unlawful command influence or could taint military investigations, according to a committee aide.
A former Marine commandant, Gen. James Amos, was criticized for unlawful command influence for forceful comments about sexual assault.
Thornberry told Allred that any panel of assault victims would include only those whose cases have been fully adjudicated.
But Allred, who also represents one of President Trump’s sexual assault accusers, said it was part of the effort to obscure the case.
“Why does the committee only want to hear success stories? Who are they really trying to protect and why do they not want to hear the truth from any survivor brave enough to testify?” she said.
