Lily Lines: The issue ignored at the presidential debate

Quick hits

Today’s featured news

Some Democrats are angry that abortion, women’s rights were ignored at debate

Democratic presidential candidates noted after Thursday night’s debate that no one asked about reproductive rights or gender pay equality.“ The #DemDebate was three hours long and not one question about abortion or reproductive rights,” Sen. Kamala D. Harris (D-Calif.) tweeted shortly after the debate ended. The absence of a conversation about reproductive health did not go unnoticed by some women watching at home, who slammed the debate moderators.“ If we’re going to have the SAME health care debate for the third debate, could we at least talk about reproductive rights once??” tweeted Christina Reynolds, vice president of communications for Emily’s List.

New sexual misconduct allegation against Brett Kavanaugh emerges

Two New York Times reporters unearthed a previously unreported allegation of sexual misconduct against Supreme Court Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh. Max Stier, a fellow student at Yale in the 1980s when Kavanaugh attended the college, said he saw Kavanaugh, then a freshman, with his pants down at a dorm party where students were drinking. Kavanaugh’s friends pushed his penis into a female student’s hand, Stier said. While Stier alerted the FBI about his account, the bureau did not investigate.

In a Times article adapted from Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly’s forthcoming book, “The Education of Brett Kavanaugh: An Investigation,” Pogrebin and Kelly write that Stier’s account echoes that of Deborah Ramirez, who told the New Yorker that Kavanaugh exposed his penis and thrust it in her face during a drunken dorm party at Yale. Ahead of Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings, Ramirez’s lawyers shared information with the FBI.

“Ms. Ramirez’s legal team gave the F.B.I. a list of at least 25 individuals who may have had corroborating evidence,” Pogrebin and Kelly write. “But the bureau — in its supplemental background investigation — interviewed none of them, though we learned many of these potential witnesses tried in vain to reach the F.B.I. on their own.”

Most new working-age hires in the U.S. are now people of color

The surge of minority women getting jobs has helped push the U.S. workforce across a historic threshold. For the first time, most new hires of prime working age (25 to 54) are people of color, according to a Washington Post analysis of Labor Department data. Among other reasons — including a tight labor market that is forcing employers to look beyond their normal pool of candidates — experts say more women are getting jobs because families need two incomes to pay bills. Minority women over age 45 have been some of the biggest job gainers now that their children are older.

Women’s Hall of Fame to induct Justice Sotomayor, Jane Fonda

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, actress Jane Fonda and attorney Gloria Allred are among the latest inductees at the National Women’s Hall of Fame. The hall in Seneca Falls, where a landmark U.S. women’s rights convention took place in 1848, doesn’t identify a theme when it calls for nominations. But induction chairwoman Sujatha Ramanujan said sometimes a theme emerges that reflects the mood of the country. “In a time when women are feeling like their voices need to be heard, they’re nominating women whose voices were loud,” Ramanujan said.

Duchess of Sussex launches clothing line to help jobless British women

Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, has launched a clothing line for a British charity that helps unemployed women find work. The line includes professional attire such as blazers, tote bags and trousers. The Smart Set collection supports Smart Works, a charity that provides women with training and interview clothes. “As women, it is 100 percent our responsibility, I think, to support and uplift each other,” she said. The announcement marked the Duchess’s return to royal duties following her maternity leave.

Powerful words

A quotable moment

Pop star Sam Smith has declared the pronouns of “they/them” on social media after coming out as non-binary. They were met with thousands of mostly supportive comments. Smith said they were excited and privileged for the support, adding that they’ve been “very nervous” about the announcement because they “care too much about what people think” but finally decided to go for it.

ICYMI

Five need-to-know stories in 100 words or less

1. Iranian media outlets reported that Sahar Khodayari died Tuesday in Tehran after setting herself on fire outside a courthouse. The 29-year-old was facing prison time after attempting to enter the city’s Azadi stadium on March 12 to watch a soccer match. The case has led to a debate in Iran about the decision to bar women from men’s soccer matches and prompted several celebrities and sports stars to speak out.

2. Actress Felicity Huffman was sentenced Friday to two weeks in jail for paying $15,000 in a conspiracy to inflate the SAT score of her older daughter — a punishment that sets a benchmark for what other accused parents could face in the college admissions bribery scandal.

3. Forbes published its list of 100 CEOs — or as it called them, “the most creative and successful business minds of today.” Readers had to scroll down to No. 75 to find the first — and only — woman on the list, Ross Stores chief executive Barbara Rentler. A social media uproar followed, and in a tweet, Forbes’s editor, Randall Lane, apologized.

4. Two buzz-generating books were released last week: “She Said,” Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey’s account of how they broke the Harvey Weinstein story for the New York Times, and “The Testaments,” Margaret Atwood’s rabidly anticipated sequel to “The Handmaid’s Tale.”

5. In an Instagram post, Chance the Rapper announced on Tuesday that he is pushing back his coming tour to help raise his newborn and 4-year-old daughters. The rapper was scheduled to go on tour later this month. While he still plans to perform at the United Center in his native Chicago on Sept. 28, his tour will be postponed until January 2020, he said.

Recognize

Remembering a history-making woman

Juanita Abernathy, long at the forefront of the civil rights movement, dies

Juanita Abernathy, who wrote the business plan for the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott and was a leader of the civil rights movement, died Sept. 12 at a hospital in Atlanta. She was 89.

Abernathy participated in several significant events of the civil rights movement, including her role in the Montgomery bus boycott, in which Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a public bus to a white man. The boycott lasted more than a year and resulted in a Supreme Court decision ruling that outlawed segregation in public transportation. She took part in the 1963 March on Washington and the 1965 march from Selma, Ala., to Montgomery in support of voting rights and led voter education programs. At the 2009 inauguration of President Barack Obama, she was seated on the dais beside two former presidents, Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush.

Lily Likes

Things we love but weren’t paid to promote

Scizza Scissors

When my pizza cutter broke in half one Friday night, I knew it was time to look into a quality pair. Instead of a traditional wheel pizza cutter, I went with these pizza scissors, which makes slicing pizza a breeze (almost takes the fun out of it). You’re left with a cleanly cut pie: no sliding cheese or toppings. I’ve also used it to cut pastry dough and quesadillas.

—Lily Deputy Editor Neema Roshania Patel

Baiku

[bye-koo] Saying goodbye with a haiku

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“Mountain Man” by Liz Cooper & the Stampede

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P.S. …

A quick, curated list of Team Lily’s go-to content this week.

‘Hustlers’ is about ‘friendship and money,’ but it isn’t a female empowerment flick. Director Lorene Scafaria explains.

They cried when Hillary Clinton lost. Who will the women of Pantsuit Nation support now?

It ‘starts the moment my body wakes up’: This is how I experience anxiety