Photo via Priscilla Giddings/Facebook
May 27, 2021, 1:48 pm
An Idaho state Republican representative is rather upset about experiencing consequences after she widely shared a link to a Redoubt News article that contained the full name and photo of a 19-year-old woman who accused former Rep. Aaron von Ehlinger of rape.
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Rep. Priscilla Giddings posted the article to her official Facebook page as well as including it in a newsletter in spite of the fact that state authorities had made efforts to keep the young woman’s identity secret to protect her from becoming a target, allowing her to testify from behind a curtain and referring to her only as “Jane Doe.”
Those efforts were wasted when Giddings spread the article from Redoubt News, which is considered to be “not so much a news source as a blog for the right-wing militia movement” by media bias watchdogs. They describe themselves as a “online publication featuring the Christian conservative culture around, and important to, the American Redoubt.”
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Giddings is now whining about being “silenced” following a call for an ethics hearing into what some are calling the doxxing of a teenage rape survivor. Though Redoubt itself may have technically done the doxxing, Giddings’ spread of the article while campaigning for lieutenant governor of Idaho spread the private information of the victim far more than the poorly-designed blog likely ever could have on its own.
During a town hall meeting at the Idaho County Veterans Outreach and Community Center, Giddings complained about receiving critical emails and tried to make herself out to be the victim.
“And my daughter has even been named in some of those,” she said through tears, referring to the emails she claimed were threatening. “I don’t have a flying career, my husband won’t be hired by some people — but we have to fight back.”
“I will not be muzzled.”
Rep. von Ehlinger resigned soon after an ethics committee voted that he should either be suspended or expelled from his seat for “misconduct” that included sexual harassment of multiple women working in the Idaho Statehouse as well as the alleged rape. He maintains that he did nothing wrong, as does Giddings on the topic of sharing an article doxxing his victim. However, ethics groups such as The Idaho 97 Project believe she should have known better.
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“Priscilla Giddings in particular is an Air Force Academy Graduate, she is a Major in the Air Force reserves, she really should know better,” said the group’s Executive Director Mike Satz. “In fact, it’s my position that she does know better and she did know better and she did what she did to intentionally harm this 19-year-old.”
In addition to whining about getting angry emails, Giddings echoed Trumpian racism about the pandemic, calling the novel coronavirus the “China virus” and railing against mandates meant to slow its spread as well as the granting of relief funding to those affected by the health crisis.
“When the China virus first hit, the governor nullified many laws,” she said. “[Gov. Brad Little] should not just be able to get rid of laws, and he has to know all Idaho businesses are essential.”
*First Published: May 27, 2021, 1:48 pm
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