Washington University’s Planned Parenthood Generation Action and Title Mine organized a “Stop Kavanaugh” protest as part of the National Youth Day of Action Thursday, Oct. 4.

The demonstration—held in front of Olin Library—was a movement of solidarity by students in support of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony against Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh. Kavanaugh was confirmed to the Supreme Court of the United States Saturday.

Danielle Drake-Flam | Student Life

A student protests Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation to the United States Supreme Court with WU Planned Parenthood

Washington University alumna and grassroots organizer for Planned Parenthood Mina Aria was an organizer of the protest. She, along with student education initiative Planned Parenthood Generation Action (PPGA), organized the demonstration in coordination with Planned Parenthood’s nationwide effort to “#SaveSCOTUS” [Supreme Court of the United States].

“There’s so much energy on campus and at Wash. U., and so many people who identify as survivors [or] who rely on healthcare. Having the choice to do what they need to do with their bodies…Kavanaugh will just wipe everything out if he is confirmed,” Aria said. “[It’s] very important that Wash. U. showed up today and held space for survivors both on and off campus and around the country.”

According to sophomore Jessica Zodicoff and senior and co-president of Planned Parenthood Generation Action Sophie Elliot, the goal of Thursday’s event was to create a safe place for individuals to share their own stories.

“To make space [where] people [could] share their emotions from over this past week because [people are upset] over obviously what happened…emotional and rightfully so,” Zodicoff said.

“Just seeing the sheer number of faces who were here…you recognize those faces and then you see them on campus, you feel a little bit safer,” Elliot said.

PPGA member and sophomore Julie Pellegrino said that she believes it’s important to support survivors of sexual assault.

“This aligns with Planned Parenthood’s views,” Pellegrino said. “We believe [women and survivors], so we helped organize this just to stand with survivors and say no to Kavanaugh.”

Eliot believes that the number of people in the United States who believed Ford’s case and didn’t care was more concerning than the those who didn’t believe her at all.

“For me right now, the scariest thing is that for as many people as there are who don’t believe her, there are people that believe her and don’t think it matters or that don’t care or don’t think that’s the reason that he should not be on the Supreme Court,” Elliot said. “This was really helpful in counteracting that because it’s easy to feel like even if people do believe you, they don’t care. This was like a show of solidarity and really outward, explicit support, which is really important.”

Planned Parenthood holds phone banks every Monday, Wednesday and Friday nights and will continue to do so until the midterm elections. According to Aria, the phone banks are a simple way for students to make a national difference.

“That’s how we want people to plug in, because that’s a really great way to change things locally and then that trickles up to the national level,” Aria said.