News Archive

With the topic of sexual harassment continuing to make headlines, IU McKinney Professor Jennifer Drobac remains a much sought-after interview subject by media outlets across the United States. She is a nationally known scholar in this area of the law.

The recent spate of interviews began in early October after the allegations against movie mogul Harvey Weinstein became common knowledge. As more women and men have come forward with similar stories aimed at others, Professor Drobac continues to give interviews in which she shares her expertise.

Professor Drobac talked about the definition of sexual harassment in an interview published in How Stuff Works on November 20.

An interview she gave on sexual harassment in state legislatures was published in USA Today on November 20.

Professor Drobac wrote a piece for Vox's "Big Idea" feature that was posted on November 20. The article delves into consent laws and the age at which science now tells us the brain fully matures.

She discussed a case involving an Internal Revenue Service agent who has been accused of rape. The story appears in the November 18 issue of the Boston Globe.

Professor Drobac talked with a reporter from OZY.com about "When Does a Big Age Gap in a Relationship Become Abuse?" The piece was posted November 16.

She spoke with a reporter from Jefferson Public Radio for a story that was published November 14 regarding sexual harassment training in the Oregon state capital. 

Professor Drobac was interviewed by the Los Angeles Times for a story that was published November 13.

In an article published in The Hill on November 11, Professor Drobac was interviewed for a story about a woman who made allegations of sexual harassment nearly 30 years ago and who was intimidated and ignored.

Professor Drobac discussed the allegations from 200 female legislators, staff members, and lobbyists who signed an open letter calling out the culture of sexual harassment going on in the state capital in Illinois. In a story published by Chicago Magazine on November 10, she said that the best way to fix the problem is to “get women into jobs that matter.” The thing that will do the most to ensure behavioral changes in these situations, she continued, is “Consequences. The best way to get at them is to remove them from positions of power.”

She was interviewed by WCCO, CBS Minnesota, for a radio show segment on sexual harassment. The interview took place on November 10. Her comments begin at the 5:45 minute mark in the online piece.

Professor Drobac spoke with Wisconsin Public Radio on November 10. Her comments begin at the 1:15 minute mark. “We are now recognizing that these are human beings deserving of compassion and vindication,” she says of the cultural shift in the way society views those who say they have been assaulted.

Professor Drobac talked with the Associated Press for a story that was published in U.S. News & World Report on November 9 regarding a move by lawmakers in Iowa to hire a human resources manager prior to the start of the next legislative session. There are questions surrounding how much authority this person would have to resolve issues.

"If they're hiring someone to monitor this problem and to be available to correct it, how is that person going to correct it if they have no outside authority and are reporting to the people who created the problem in the first place?"  Professor Drobac said in the story.

She talked with TRTWorld for a story posted November 10 that considers the recent allegations against comedian Louis C.K., and Alabama U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore.

Professor Drobac talked with the San Francisco Chronicle for a story that was published November 9.

She was interviewed by the newspaper, The Tennessean, for a story about a country music publicist who has come under fire recently for sexual harassment. In the piece, which was published November 5, she addresses the #MeToo campaign, which encourages victims to share their stories on social media.

“It caused an awareness of how pervasive this phenomenon is and how often it happens," Drobac said. She further relates that more such claims are inevitable, as the issue has been rampant and under-reported for decades. "This is a public health crisis. It has to be viewed this way," she said. “Until we recognize that this is a problem everywhere, including in our own backyard, in our own industries, then we really don’t have a prayer for wiping out this cancer.”

Professor Drobac was interviewed by Chicago radio station WGN for a discussion that was broadcast November 5. She talks about the prevalence of sexual violence in the nation and the recent movement to change the culture.

Professor Drobac discussed what the law says regarding sexual harassment between equals for an Associated Press story that has been published in multiple media outlets, including the Washington Post. The news story centers on federal lawmakers from California who have experienced sexual harassment from their colleagues in the House and Senate.

She was interviewed by National Public Radio station KCRW in Santa Monica, California, for a story that aired on November 1. In the piece, she talks about “What are the legal lines on harassment.”

She was interviewed by Beltway News for a story that was posted October 30.

In a story that appeared on Reuters, which has also been published in the New York Times, Professor Drobac talked about the California statute of limitations, which an accuser will have to contend with in order to pursue her case.

In a story published by the Washington Post, Professor Drobac talked about how she utilizes these kinds of incidents as illustrations in her classroom. “I tell my law students, if you have a partnership, you need to be monitoring the behavior of your partners,” she said in the story. “You share liability.”

An interview she conducted with MarketWatch in early October is part of a larger piece on the Weinstein allegations that appears on the website, Movies Cheat Sheet. Professor Drobac also gave an interview that details how this kind of behavior impacts the careers of victims to Investors Hub.

In a story published by ArsTechnica, Professor Drobac calls, "patently false," the claim that tech pundit Robert Scoble didn't sexually harass any of his accusers because they were not his employees. She also points out that Scoble's company may be liable. "If a company knows that Scoble is doing this and they do not correct his behavior to create a safe and hospitable work environment for women, they are liable even if the people they are harassing are clients or professional associates or people on the street," Professor Drobac says in the story. "If he’s doing it on company time on corporate business locales, the company may be held liable under California law and possibly under federal law."

She talked about the Weinstein story with Morning Consult in an interview published October 19. The piece delves into attitudes toward Weinstein, and Professor Drobac discusses the short memory the public often has in terms of wrongdoing.

Professor Drobac spoke with CNN Money for a story published October 16. In the piece, she talked about the strength in numbers that is often necessary in these kinds of situations for victims to come forward.

“When women are going to be isolated and receive death threats by trolls, they aren’t going to want to come forward,” she told CNN.

“I don’t know how many times we’re going to have to learn these lessons with these powerful men, but it does highlight that power can really ruin people’s lives when it’s abused, and this is really more about power than it is about sexual attraction,” Professor Drobac said October 10 on the program, Knowledge@Wharton. The program is available for download through a series of sound files.

Professor Drobac also discussed the case on the National Public Radio program, “On Point,” on October 11. Her comments on the accusations can be heard beginning at the 19:45 mark.

She was also quoted in an article on CNN Money on October 13 titled "How do you report sexual harassment when there's no HR?" by Julia Horowitz and Sara Ashley O'Brien.

Dealing with the imbalance of power in the workplace, talking about the issue of sexual harassment, and women coming forward when they have been harassed will go a long way toward combating the problem, Professor Drobac said on the program.

“But it’s also important for the men in our society to support women in the moment or later on either saying something to the harasser, supporting the woman coming forward. We also need to approach it in the legal system and make some changes,” she said. Some of Weinstein’s accusers settled cases against him, and Professor Drobac recommends changes to this area of the law. “The fact that these settlements are confidential and that women are under gag orders, that needs to change. We need sunshine laws. If you want to keep the settlement amount confidential, fine, but the underlying facts should be public.”

Professor Drobac’s latest book, Sexual Exploitation of Teenagers: Adolescent Development, Discrimination, and Consent Law, was published by University of Chicago Press. She was recently a Visiting Fellow at Clare Hall and at the Faculty of Law at the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England. She was researching a new book, The Myth of Consent, that she will write with Professor Oliver Goodenough.