Elizabeth Holmes: Girlboss or victim?

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Jan 07, 2022 View in browser   By Katelyn Fossett Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Happy Friday, rulers! I missed all of you over the break. I'm glad to be back and I'm glad to be in 2022, the year where I'm finally feeling confident enough that things will get back to normal that I've started buying concert tickets again. Thank you to Maya Parthasarathy for helping me find the best links on women and gender this week. On to the news this week … Just how much was Elizabeth Holmes in charge at Theranos? That question has been a big part of both the charges against the CEO of the blood testing company and her defense. On Monday, Holmes was found guilty on four charges relating to defrauding investors in her company, which promised its technology could screen users for diseases with just a small blood sample. A series of investigations by the Wall Street Journal beginning in 2015 exposed problems with the miracle technology touted by the company, ultimately leading to Holmes' indictment. Holmes, a woman who founded Theranos when she was just 19, was a rarity in Silicon Valley. She was not just very young; she was one of a handful of women in a very male field — a trait that fed the publicity machine that saw her grace covers of T: The New York Times Style Magazine, Forbes and Fortune and get named one of Glamour's Eight Women of the Year in 2015. Add to that her ambition and drive, and you had a group of very influential admirers apparently mesmerized by Holmes. In a Time profile , Henry Kissinger called her "striking, somewhat ethereal, iron-willed." More recently, the two qualities that were such a large part of her own personal brand — her gender and relative youth — became central to her defense. Her defense team portrayed her not as a powerful, determined boss, but as a victim of emotional and physical abuse by Sunny Balwani, Holmes' ex-boyfriend and former deputy at Theranos, which they suggested affected her judgment and business choices at the company. Ultimately, though, jurors appeared to not be swayed by that argument, given the guilty verdict they delivered earlier this week. "She had a hard time with that defense," said Carrie Cohen, a former federal and state prosecutor and a current partner at the firm Morrison and Foerster. "It's hard to present herself as this manipulated person when at the same time her own statements showed that she was saying 'The buck stops with me,' and 'It's my own company.'" Cohen didn't want to discount the evidence of what appeared to be a fairly abusive relationship, but she wasn't convinced that undermined Holmes' culpability. "Given all the other statements and all the other evidence, I don't think it means she couldn't have formed the intent to defraud the investors." So what's next? I asked Cohen if she expected prosecutors to go after Balwani, Holmes' co-defendant, as energetically as they did Holmes. After all, some critics have pointed to the fact that Holmes' company was making exaggerated promises in a business landscape overwhelmed by those kinds of promises; they suspect Holmes' gender made her more of a target. Cohen, though, does not think Balwani should expect lighter treatment. "If prosecutors believe 120 percent that someone committed a federal crime, they are always energetic," she said. Cohen also isn't ready to say the Holmes trial will make Silicon Valley investors less likely to fund women-run companies than they already are. "It's somewhat unfortunate that there have been so few women who have made it in Silicon Valley and the one that on paper looked like she has that … it was basically a house of cards," she said. "But … I'm not willing to draw the conclusion that that means that women won't be trusted more than men, moreso now than ... before." POLITICO Special Report AP Photo/Brynn Anderson "MTG hit with Facebook suspension after Twitter ban," by Nick Niedzwiadek for POLITICO: "Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said Monday she has been temporarily barred from posting on her Facebook account by the social network, less than a day after losing her personal Twitter account. "'Facebook has joined Twitter in censoring me,' Greene (R-Ga.) wrote on Gettr, a social media platform favored by some right-wing conservatives. 'This is beyond censorship of speech.' "Greene's post included a screenshot appearing to show that she would be prohibited from posting or commenting from her Facebook account for a period of 24 hours for violating the platform's policy against misinformation — a characterization she disputed."   Sponsored by Business Leader members of Women Rule: The Exchange: What will it take to build a new, more equitable workplace? POLITICO Focus connected with members of Women Rule: The Exchange to get their perspectives on some of the critical topics — diversity and inclusion, equal pay, mental health and family-friendly policies — that are driving this debate and will make or break the future of work for women. Read More   "Liz Cheney on Trump: He's a threat to American democracy," by David Cohen for POLITICO: "Rep. Liz Cheney said Sunday she fears that if former President Donald Trump were to become president again, it could be a lethal blow to American democracy. "'He crossed lines no American president has ever crossed before,' the Wyoming Republican told host George Stephanopoulos on ABC's 'This Week,' days before the anniversary of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. "'You know, we entrust the survival of our republic into the hands of the chief executive, and when a president refuses to tell the mob to stop, when he refuses to defend any of the coordinate branches of government, he cannot be trusted.'" Number of the Week Read more here. MUST READS AP Photo "The Lost Girls of Covid," by Jill Filipovic for Bloomberg Businessweek: "At the girls' rescue house down the quiet end of a dusty road in Narok County, Kenya, there are girls who are friends, and then there are Purity and Lucy. Sisters, they both say. Purity is 17; Lucy, 19. Where Purity is soft-spoken and shy, Lucy is gregarious and funny, with expressive eyebrows and a sardonic affect. When she smiles — and she smiles a lot — the corners of her mouth turn almost vertical, and her cheeks, still freckled with teenage acne, go full and flush. Purity is slender as tall grass, with glowing skin and a gap in her lower teeth that she habitually pokes her tongue through. Both grew up in traditional Masai communities, in different areas that are within striking distance of Masai Mara National Reserve, a game park that, in normal times, draws hundreds of thousands of visitors a year. Neither one's parents went to school; Purity and Lucy were set to be among the first generation of girls in their communities to graduate from high school, maybe even from college. "When Covid-19 led the Kenyan government to shutter schools and ban large gatherings, the operators of the rescue house — a nonprofit shelter that offers girls a base where they can live and from which they can go to school — had little choice but to comply. The risk that a deadly disease could rip through the crowded dormitories and infect scores of girls with little access to health care was too high to do otherwise. The operators secured promises from the girls' families that they would be treated well and sent them home. Purity and Lucy left in March 2020, returning to homes where their fathers drank heavily, often became violent, and routinely kicked them out, forcing the girls to sleep in the bush. Each felt lucky when a man from the community approached her, offering a little food, shelter, and money. Almost a year after leaving the rescue house, Purity and Lucy returned, both just weeks away from giving birth. … "The extent of the indirect damage Covid has brought is difficult to measure. What's known so far, though, suggests that it could outweigh the disease's direct effects in Kenya and many other African nations. The economic and social fallout of shutdowns is concentrated among the young, and almost a quarter of Kenya's population is between 10 and 19. Purity, Lucy, and their peers have been hit by a shadow epidemic ripping through developing countries — pushing girls out of school, decreasing their earning potential, putting them at greater risk of violence, and potentially shortening their lives and those of their children." "The New Political Cry in South Korea: 'Out With Man Haters,'" by Choe Sang-Hun in the New York Times: "SEOUL — They have shown up whenever women rallied against sexual violence and gender biases in South Korea. Dozens of young men, mostly dressed in black, taunted the protesters, squealing and chanting, "Thud! Thud!" to imitate the noise they said the "ugly feminist pigs" made when they walked. "'Out with man haters!' they shouted. 'Feminism is a mental illness!' "On the streets, such rallies would be easy to dismiss as the extreme rhetoric of a fringe group. But the anti-feminist sentiments are being amplified online, finding a vast audience that is increasingly imposing its agenda on South Korean society and politics. "These male activists have targeted anything that smacks of feminism, forcing a university to cancel a lecture by a woman they accused of spreading misandry. They have vilified prominent women, criticizing An San, a three-time gold medalist in the Tokyo Olympics, for her short haircut."   Sponsored by Business Leader members of Women Rule: The Exchange: The pandemic brought corporate America to a tipping point. Business leaders weigh in on the issues that will make or break the future of work for women.   "'I don't feel safe': A year after January 6, women in Congress still fear for their security," by Candice Norwood and Mariel Padilla for The 19th: "In recent years, more women in public office have spoken out about the harassment they experience and threats to their safety. For women of color in Congress, like [Rep. Nikema] Williams, the sense of danger is heightened by threats and abuse that are both racist and sexist. In many ways, January 6 was the most extreme in a string of escalating threats. "The 19th reached out at least three times to all 24 women senators and 120 women voting members of the House to discuss the one-year anniversary of the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol. Thirty-eight of them, all Democrats, spoke to us, and many expressed continuing fear for their own safety, both at the Capitol and at home. Some women in Congress said their Republican colleagues exacerbate the danger they face. For all of the women, the shadow of that day looms large. "Many said it has led them to be hypervigilant, often adding security and being more aware — and frightened — of people around them. "'I've never really thought of my job as a dangerous type of job, but I remember in the days after my parents were asking if I really had to be in that position, couldn't I find another job?' said Rep. Grace Meng of New York." "Betty White's Comic Reversals," by Susan Orlean for the New Yorker Quote of the Week Betty White died on Dec. 31. Read more quotes from her about aging in Hollywood here. Recommendations "The Movie That Understands the Secret Shame of Motherhood," by Shirley Li for the Atlantic … "A Debut Novel About Friendship, Family and Other Ties That Bind," by Sunny Hostin for the New York Times Transitions The SCORE Foundation announced the appointment of Liz Sara as its new president. Previously, Sara ran Best Marketing LLC, a strategic marketing firm. … Caroline Kitchener is moving to WaPo's politics team to cover the politics of abortion. She most recently has covered gender for WaPo's The Lily, which announced this week it will no longer be publishing as a separate section of the Post. …   Sponsored by Business Leader members of Women Rule: The Exchange: COVID-19 has upended the American workplace — and it continues to shine a light on what isn't working — particularly for women. But within every crisis, there is opportunity. Women Rule: The Exchange brings together leading women in business each quarter to confront these challenges and help find solutions to today's most pressing issues at the intersection of gender, industry and policy. Most recently, this included an examination of the future of America's working women. In this inaugural edition of 'view from The Exchange,' we sat down with a few of these leaders to continue the conversation and get their perspectives on some of the critical topics — diversity and inclusion, equal pay, mental health and family-friendly policies — that are driving this debate and will make or break the future of work for women.   Jennifer Shapiro is joining New York Life's office of governmental affairs as corporate VP. She most recently was chief of staff for Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.). … Julie Crimmins is joining Curley Company as VP, group manager. She previously was a VP at Ketchum. … Maggie McNerney is joining Ketchum as an account supervisor. She previously was a senior director at Dezenhall Resources.   Follow us on Twitter Katelyn Fossett @KatelynFossett   Follow us

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