The 2026 midterm elections have seen something of a resurgence in MeToo campaign tactics, as select candidates have faced charges of past sexual assault.
Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell was felled in his campaign for California governor due to allegations, and subsequently resigned from Congress. Democrat Graham Platner similarly suspended his campaign for Senate in Maine after being dogged by accusations of assault in his dating history. More recently, Rep. Max Miller, an Ohio Republican, is facing an investigation over allegations of abuse against his ex-wife.
Cheyenne Hunt, a left-wing Democratic activist based out of Orange County, California, was a key figure in targeting Swalwell and Platner. In subsequent comments regarding Miller, it is clear that she sticks to the “guilty until proven innocent” ethos of the original MeToo movement.
In an interview with PBS, after Speaker of the House Mike Johnson announced an investigation into Miller’s conduct, Hunt implied that such an investigation was not necessary. According to her, “I mean, I think that they are invoking this language that suggests what we’re talking about is a process in a court of law. But we’re not. We’re talking about the people that deserve to represent us in the highest offices in the land. It is an entirely different standard.”
The result of the approach favored by Hunt, of course, is that politicians should be forced to resign simply based off allegations, evidence be damned. Conservatives may enjoy the results when such tactics take down Democratic candidates, but the overall approach is as culturally poisonous as when it was first introduced.
In any case, MeToo tactics targeting Democratic candidates are always used in the service of intraparty candidate disputes that do not meaningfully damage the party overall – Swalwell will be replaced with another Democrat, and the Maine Senate race was going to be competitive with or without Platner.
Hunt herself previously supported Platner before turning on him, and it is not entirely obvious what specific factional point of view she represents within her party. For all the talk of how “fair” Democrats are with MeTooing their own, though, the Republican approach to the issue is the correct one. Democrats would like to pretend we live in a world where vindictive accusations never happen, and allegations of sexual assault become simply another weapon in their political arsenal. Personal scandals have always been a part of hardball politics, but the automatic presumption of guilt hasn’t, and shouldn’t.
