Well, last week was a pretty bananas week for Nebraska politics. Eight women (eight!) made serious and disturbing allegations of sexual assault against gubernatorial candidate Charles Herbster. The allegations include claims of groping (both outside of and under clothing) and forcible kissing.

I’m not a human lie detector. I don’t have any first-hand knowledge of what happened. The purpose of this essay is to respond to Herbster’s reaction to the allegations—specifically, that “Governor Ricketts and Him Pillen’s campaign team have peddled this made-up story from one news outlet to another without any success…The fake-news story is based upon shadowy, unnamed sources and one person who was appointed by Governor Ricketts…it’s libelous fake news.”

Herbster’s claim that this is a political conspiracy requires us to think about what that would mean for these eight women. Because if anything is clear from my time as a prosecutor, defense attorney, and victims’ counsel, it’s that accusations of sexual assault can be absolutely brutal—for the accuser.