March organizers hope to capitalize on opposition to Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court and to influence the 2020 presidential race.
After the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh advanced on Friday to a vote by the full Senate, organizers of the Women’s March said messages came pouring in.
The confirmation proceedings, particularly the testimony of Christine Blasey Ford, who accused Judge Kavanaugh of sexual assault decades ago, rallied women who themselves had been sexually assaulted or harassed.
Even as the Senate waits for a renewed F. B. I. background check before a final vote on Judge Kavanaugh, who has denied the accusations, many saw the support for him as an endorsement of a culture that fosters and allows sexual misconduct .
People were “enraged,” Linda Sarsour, a chairwoman of the Women’s March, said on Saturday.
“Our email inboxes were full: ‘Women’s March, where are you? When are we marching? Tell us when? Tell us where?’” she said.
Ms. Sarsour and her fellow organizers delivered an answer: Jan. 19,2019. That’s when they plan to hold a third Women’s March, bringing the main demonstration back to Washington, where it was held two years ago.
Ms. Sarsour said organizers focused this year’s march on Nevada, a battleground state. The 2019 march, like previous marches, will feature demonstrations in cities around the world.
Organizers are trying to capitalize on momentum generated from the opposition to Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination and the time leading up to the 2018 midterm elections to make a forceful statement to influence the 2020 presidential race.
There is still much to be done: Organizers are determining what route to take at the march’s center in Washington, and are working to get needed permits. If the 2017 march was any indication, the demonstration has the potential to draw hundreds of thousands of people.
Ms. Sarsour said the 2019 march would be different in that organizers plan to call for a specific set of public policies they want enacted.
Those policies will be announced in the coming weeks, but they are expected to align with progressive causes in immigration, such as protections for young undocumented immigrants against deportation, and women’s rights, such as empowering survivors of sexual misconduct on college campuses.
When the first Women’s March on Washington was held in 2017, a day after President Trump’s inauguration, organizers hoped it would be the beginning of a sustained movement for an array of progressive causes, including equal pay, immigrant rights and environmental protection, as well as measures against police brutality, mass incarceration and voter suppression.
The march became a channel through which women and other progressive organizations have opposed the Trump administration, promoted the #MeToo movement and challenged male power and privilege.
Some began to wonder whether factionalization was dampening the momentum of the Women’s March or its supporters. Ms. Sarsour disagreed, pointing to a surge of female candidates running in the 2018 midterms who were winning primary races in record numbers.
She acknowledged that the Trump administration had pushed through policies that could be seen as setbacks for the movement, including a move by the secretary of education, Betsy DeVos, to bolster the rights of students accused of sexual misconduct .
But Ms. Sarsour said those setbacks helped energize the movement.
“They are short-term defeats,” she said. “It’s only temporary until November and until January and until 2020.”
