The groundswell of women President Trump has inspired to run for office this year now includes one who has accused him of sexual misconduct.

Rachel Crooks, who during the 2016 presidential election claimed Trump once kissed her without her consent, is running for the state legislature in Ohio, Cosmopolitan has learned exclusively. She adds her name to the record number of women candidates in 2018, the next step of the feminist wave that began with the Women’s March last year. A Democrat and first-time candidate, Crooks says she was stirred to run because, despite the #MeToo movement felling powerful men in a broad range of industries, the president has escaped the consequences of his alleged sexual abuse.

“I think my voice should have been heard then, and I'll still fight for it to be heard now,” Crooks, 35, says. “Americans are really upset with politics as usual, and I want to be a voice for them.”

“Americans are really upset with politics as usual, and I want to be a voice for them.”

In October 2016, Crooks alleged that she had been yet another victim of Trump’s unwanted touching. She said that in 2005, as a 22-year-old receptionist at a company whose office was in Trump Tower, she introduced herself to the man whose name was on the side of the building. He kissed her cheeks and then moved to her mouth. “I was so upset that he thought I was so insignificant that he could do that," she told the New York Times. (Trump has denied all allegations of sexual misconduct.)

In speaking out in 2016, she hoped that she might help sway an election by adding another voice to the chorus of women pulling back the curtain on the scandal-marred candidate. Now — after taking the bus to Washington, D.C. for the Women’s March in January 2017 and voicing her displeasure that Trump still hasn't been held accountable for his alleged behavior — she’s taking direct action. "I think there will be a lot of people who see value in [my campaign]," she says. "But I hope more so because I'm a viable candidate rather than a participant in the #MeToo movement."

She’s running in Ohio’s 88th district, a rural area outside of Toledo, to help create more jobs, ensure access to affordable health care, and fix the state’s education system. Charter schools there, she notes, are given about $1 billion each year, with what critics say is little accountability. That money, she says, would be better served in public schools.

Crooks has worked primarily in student affairs at universities and is now the director of international student recruitment at Heidelberg University in northwest Ohio. “What I’ve learned working, especially with international students, is just understanding different perspectives. And really having empathy for others,” she says. “You need to understand where people are coming from. Right now, it seems very polarized in politics. I think if you can empathize with others, you can possibly reach common ground.”

She has the backing of the Ohio State Democratic Party, and if she wins her May primary, she’ll face two-term incumbent Republican Rep. Bill Reineke. Though the district went for Trump in 2016, Crooks says that, given his "erratic and ineffective" presidency, they may now be rethinking their decision to vote for him. That, she says, along with the surge of political activism in the wake of his election, will help her win.

“Democrats are here. But it almost felt like we didn't know that we were out there,” she says. “I think there's this momentum now that Trump has been elected, that we know there are more of us out there, and we're more active in politics.”



Crooks says she's always been interested in politics but didn't seriously consider running until women in her liberal resistance group, Seneca County Rising, suggested she’d make a good candidate.

“I think like a lot of women, because we've been historically underrepresented in politics, I didn't necessarily see myself in this role," she says. "But multiple people encouraged and said, 'I think you would be great.' Once you hear it a few times, you start to believe it a little bit, and fully consider it. Once I sat down and mulled it over, I felt like it really was a duty that I had, that I should take on this responsibility firsthand and try to make a difference for other people.”

“Women are uniting. The momentum is now. I want to be part of it.”

She knows that there will be backlash, that critics will say she’s only capitalizing on her 15 minutes. But it’s nothing she hasn’t dealt with before, she says, referring to the response she got when she first made her claims about Trump. “I think I've read and seen about as negative of things as I can about myself."

Besides, she says, this is a historic moment.

“Women are uniting. The momentum is now. I want to be part of it.”

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Rebecca Nelson Rebecca Nelson is a magazine writer in New York.

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