Former clerk: Judge Stephen Reinhardt sexually harassed me

All of that provides the context within which I experienced direct sexual harassment. Judge Reinhardt routinely and frequently made disparaging statements about my physical appearance, my views about feminism and women’s rights, and my relationship with my husband (including our sexual relationship). Often, these remarks included expressing surprise that I even had a husband because I was not a woman who any man would be attracted to. In that vein, Judge Reinhardt often speculated that my husband must be a “wimp,” or possibly gay. Judge Reinhardt would use both words and gestures to suggest that my “wimp” husband must either lack a penis, or not be able to get an erection in my presence. He implied that my marriage had not been consummated. I was subjected on a weekly, and sometimes daily, basis to these types of comments about my husband, our relationship, and my being a woman who no man would marry—which he attributed both to my being a feminist and to my physical appearance, including my “short” stature. Judge Reinhardt made these comments to me when we were alone, and also in front of other members of chambers at times.

The atmosphere in chambers worsened in late 2017 with the start of the Me Toomovement, which became Judge Reinhardt’s favorite topic of conversation. He frequently discussed and always cast doubt upon credible allegations of sexual harassment. The doubts he expressed were sometimes based on his assessment of the attractiveness of the accuser, and sometimes based on his general incredulity that men could be harassing women. For example, Judge Reinhardt told me that the allegations of sexual harassment that came out against people like Louis CK and Harvey Weinstein were made by women who had initially “wanted it,” and then changed their minds.Regarding Louis CK, he repeatedly asked me to explain to him why a man would want to show a woman his penis or masturbate in front of her. When I could not satisfy these kinds of questions about the alleged choices of men, Judge Reinhardt often responded by telling me that women were liars who could not be trusted. Sometimes, he read me emails that he exchanged with his friends about the Me Too movement that cast doubt on women raising sexual harassment and misconduct allegations. When I engaged in these discussions with him and would try to explain that sexual harassment was indeed a pervasive problem, he regularly replied with the same playbook I described above—that I did not understand sexual harassment because I was not attractive, that I did not understand men because I was a feminist, and that my husband was not a real man.