Oct 20, 2017

Before media firestorms, decades of assaults

One common trait shared by recent high-profile sexual assault scandals is that it took a major media event for many of the women to come forward with their stories. For some, the alleged assault happened decades ago.

How we collected the data: This visual is based on multiple press reports from other news organizations, all of which covered the alleged assaults in detail. To get more information on them, you can take a look at the underlying data and find the links to the news sources here.

Worth noting: Cosby, Ailes, O'Reilly and Weinstein were all condemned — and to an extent, punished — once the allegations against them were brought to light. One month after Trump's "Access Hollywood" tape leaked and more than 20 women came forward with allegations of sexual assault, he was elected president.

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