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Multiple major wildfires, fanned by unusually strong seasonal winds, are currently burning through the Los Angeles area, leaving devastation in their wake.

Thus far, those fires have led to at least five fatalities, massive evacuations, and significant damage to more than 2,000 buildings. 

Though destructive fire seasons have become increasingly common in California, it’s still relatively rare to see a major urban area facing fires in the way Los Angeles now is. But as populations have grown in communities that are close to vegetation and open space, experts told Vox, the risks of wildfires moving into denser, urban areas has increased. That dynamic is compounded by climate change, which has fueled extreme heat and parched the landscape in regions like Southern California that are already susceptible to wildfires. 

Collectively, these factors mean that wildfires may become more frequent in urban areas — and while cities do have some safeguards in place against these natural disasters, there are dangerous sources of fuel in them, too. 

Urban fires “have become more common and severe,” says fire historian and Arizona State University professor emeritus Steve Pyne. “A problem that we thought we had fixed has returned.” 

What are the risks of wildfires moving into urban areas?

For places that are located near vegetation, as many parts of Los Angeles are, the fire risk can be high. 

“In the Southern California urban areas … we see a highly dense, large urban area butting right up to highly flammable shrub ecosystems,” says Mark Schwartz, a University of California Davis conservation scientist. 

These cities have sections that exist in what researchers call the wildland-urban interface, or WUI, where human development meets “undeveloped wildland” and vegetation. That means these populated areas are close to or intersect with natural ones like forests and grasslands.

Such adjacency to vegetation — especially in regions like the arid Western US, which is prone to fires — directly increases a city’s risk because blazes that typically begin in brush and shrubbery can move quickly through abundant fuel sources. 

That danger is especially acute for Los Angeles right now, as Santa Ana wind gusts hit nearly 100 miles per hour — potentially carrying flames rapidly from where they begin.

In general, more people have also been moving into wildland-urban interface spaces, increasing the population and activity in these areas, says Noah Diffenbaugh, a climate scientist at Stanford University. That means more risk to humans living there, and also more potential for fires to start. While lightning strikes can and often do spark wildfires, most blazes are caused by people; past conflagrations have started because of campfires, an irresponsibly discarded cigarette, or downed power lines.  

“Where there are humans, there’s plentiful sources of ignition, and where those sources of ignition are near vegetation that can burn, that elevates the risk,” Diffenbaugh said. 

Climate change only amplifies such hazards: The clearest signal that climate change is influencing the severity of fires is the rising temperatures, which lead to more fuels, such as dry vegetation, that are primed to burn.

Cities that are more “hardscaped” (comprised of materials like concrete and metal) and farther from sources of vegetation have lower fire risk. Those that have greenery can also make themselves more fire resistant with mitigation practices like prescribed burns (controlled fires meant to simultaneously reduce fire risk and promote healthy vegetation growth), more native plants, and less vegetation near structures. 

What fuel sources exist in cities that could keep major fires churning?

Homes, as well as vegetation, can serve as fuel for fires. Other structures like natural gas tanks and fuel depots can exacerbate blazes if they catch on fire, says Stephanie Pincetl, a University of California Los Angeles professor of environment and sustainability. 

According to Schwartz, “Once a fire moves into an urban area, house to house ignitions becomes the biggest concern.” Homes built of wood can be flammable, and embers can also be blown into structures via vents and windows, so a house can catch fire and burn from the inside, even if the exterior is fire-proof. Free-standing single-family homes — compared to row homes, which often share walls with neighboring buildings — can be especially vulnerable to fires because of how many exterior-facing walls they have and the number of different points where a fire can catch, Pincetl notes. 

In cities like Los Angeles, drier vegetation like palm trees can also provide fuel for wildfires. 

What’s the worst damage we’ve seen wildfires do to cities in recent memory?

The Camp Fire, which took place in northern central California in 2018, is the deadliest in state history. It caused 85 fatalities, destroyed more than 18,000 structures — including burning almost completely through the town of Paradise, California — and burned over 153,000 acres. 

It was so destructive due to similar conditions we’re witnessing in Los Angeles County this week: “High winds piled on top of dry fuels,” Schwartz said, emphasizing that the wind played a particularly significant role in spreading the flames. As Wired’s Matt Simon explained, the wind during the Camp Fire helped carry “billions” of embers, which started a number of small fires farther from the front lines of the main blaze. Those embers ignited homes and other structures across Paradise — making the fire tougher to contain. 

Many homes within Paradise were also more vulnerable to fire. Almost all the homes in town had been built prior to 2008, when California imposed a new fire-safe building code that requires the use of certain materials for building exteriors and roofs, the Los Angeles Times reported. 

The leveling of Paradise was devastating: Before the fire, around 27,000 people lived in the community. As of 2023, its population was fewer than 10,000 (though it has continued to rebound since the fire). The fires burning in Los Angeles County threaten a far denser urban area: Today, almost 10 million people live in Los Angeles County.

Both wind and ample dry vegetation have also contributed to the growth of the recent Los Angeles fires, which have spread as the area has experienced both moderate drought conditions and a massive windstorm.

Experts say it’s “unlikely” that the current wildfires could damage all of Los Angeles due to both the diversity of landscapes in the city and the precautions that it — and other cities — have taken to strengthen firefighting forces and use more fire-resistant building materials such as plaster and concrete. “Cities used to be very, very flammable,” Pincetl said. “Over the decades, we have learned to build cities that are far less vulnerable to catching on fire.”

“It used to be back in the late 1800s, for example, that entire cities would be lost because everything was made out of the same wood material,” Tim Brown, a researcher at the Desert Research Institute, told Vox. “In today’s built environment, there are varying building materials, especially in urban and commercial centers, that would allow for much easier fire control.”

With President Donald Trump’s second administration just weeks away, congressional Republicans are gearing up to execute on a wide-ranging legislative agenda touching on everything from taxes to immigration to fossil fuels. In a Monday interview with radio host Hugh Hewitt, Trump noted that his preference for doing so was “one big, beautiful bill,” but said he’d be open to two. 

To accomplish that, Republicans intend to use a process known as budget reconciliation, which allows them to approve budget-related legislation with a simple majority in the Senate. Doing so enables them to bypass filibuster rules, which would otherwise require a bill to garner 60 votes to advance in the upper chamber. (In this case, with the Senate divided 53-47 in favor of Republicans, passing a bill through normal order would also require Democratic votes.)

There’s a catch for using this process, though, and it could become a major roadblock to parts of Trump’s agenda. As the name suggests, budget reconciliation is only intended to advance policies — such as spending and tax measures — that have a significant effect on the budget and not just an incidental one. Additionally, a restriction called the Byrd rule says that policies included in a budget reconciliation package aren’t supposed to affect Social Security or add to the deficit after 10 years. Provisions that don’t meet these standards typically get stripped out following an intensive review process, an outcome that has stymied both parties in the past. 

Review of the legislation is done by congressional experts, including the Senate parliamentarian — a nonpartisan official who advises on the interpretation of congressional rules — to determine whether a bill meets these parameters. Lawmakers have the option to ignore the parliamentarian’s judgments, but it’s not common, and new Senate Majority Leader John Thune has already said Republicans should not do so.

There’s still a lot that lawmakers can do using reconciliation. In 2022, Democrats were able to pass the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which included expansive clean energy tax credits, and in 2021, they approved the American Rescue Plan, which included Covid-19 aid and an expanded child tax credit. 

In 2017, Republicans similarly advanced the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act using this process, and will likely look to extend those tax cuts in their upcoming package. 

Other policies aren’t likely to pass muster if their primary impact isn’t budgetary, however. That was previously the case when Democrats tried to include a federal $15 minimum wage in the American Rescue Plan, and when they attempted to include a path to citizenship for DACA recipients in a version of the Build Back Better bill. Both were removed following the parliamentarian’s ruling, and the same could be done in a prospective Republican bill, including on issues like immigration and energy, to measures that aren’t primarily focused on spending and taxation.

What the GOP can do via reconciliation

Tax cuts and efforts to roll back tax credits are among the policies that have been approved via reconciliation in the past and that are likely to have limited issues moving forward via this process again. In this case, that would include GOP plans to extend the tax cuts the party passed in 2017, such as changes to individual tax brackets and business deductions. It also includes potential efforts to repeal clean energy tax credits that Democrats approved as part of the IRA in 2022, including tax credits for electric vehicles.  

“Any tax cut — as long as it isn’t to Social Security and as long as it doesn’t add to the deficit beyond the decade — is fair game,” Marc Goldwein, the senior vice president and senior policy director for the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, told Vox. “The entire Inflation Reduction Act was done through reconciliation, and it could be reversed through reconciliation or modified through reconciliation.”

Policies that include more spending for immigration-related purposes — as long as they don’t touch discretionary funds — would likely be fine as well, Goldwein said. Republicans are constrained when it comes to passing new immigration policies using reconciliation, but they could, for instance, allocate more spending for a border wall, border patrol agents, and detention of immigrants at the border. 

“Additional funds for various purposes — e.g., construction of the wall — have been deemed valid by the parliamentarian, since the spending is the primary purpose of the provision,” says Shai Akabas, director of economic policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center. “Funding for the IRS that was included in the Inflation Reduction Act would be one good example of this type of provision.” 

In the IRA, Democrats included $80 billion in mandatory spending for the IRS, distributed over roughly a decade. Republicans could incorporate a comparable provision on border security and immigration spending this cycle. 

Changes to other mandatory spending programs like Medicaid and SNAP are also allowed under reconciliation, Goldwein notes. That means that Republicans could pass provisions like more work requirements for SNAP or changes to Medicaid’s matching rates for different services. 

Which policies might not survive reconciliation

The policies that are less likely to advance through reconciliation are ones that are viewed as primarily accomplishing other policy ends, even if they also have an effect on the budget. These constraints will probably curtail the immigration and energy policies that Republicans are able to incorporate. 

In 2021, for example, Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough determined that Democrats could not include a path to citizenship for DACA recipients — undocumented immigrants who came to the US as children — in a $3.5 trillion version of the Build Back Better bill. Democrats had argued that such efforts would have a significant budgetary impact and allow more immigrants to access social programs, but MacDonough ruled that these effects would be secondary to the main purpose of the law, which was to provide DACA recipients a way to achieve legal status. 

In the new Congress, other proposals to alter immigration policy — like past Republican bills to make seeking asylum harder — similarly wouldn’t be possible via reconciliation, says Heidi Altman, the director of federal advocacy at the National Immigration Law Center. Attempts to change eligibility for work visas or the number of visas available would also likely face uncertainty, experts told Vox. 

“Things that are changing funding for immigration, no problem,” Goldwein said. “Where it gets tricky is when they’re making regulatory changes that have budgetary effects.”

On the energy front, the same logic holds, with regulatory changes more likely to be struck from the bill by the parliamentarian. Republicans have expressed an interest in considering permitting reform — which could expedite approvals for energy and infrastructure projects — as part of reconciliation, though it’s not clear that would gain the parliamentarian’s approval. Rolling back vehicle emissions standards that were set during the Biden administration is also likely to be a contentious inclusion. 

Congress typically listens to the parliamentarian 

Because the Senate largely determines its own rules and norms, lawmakers have the ability to disregard the parliamentarian’s ruling, or to even fire an official they disagree with. It’s not common to do so, however. 

Experts note that ignoring the parliamentarian would be a rare and significant break from tradition, and one that the Senate isn’t likely to entertain. In a Monday interview with Punchbowl News, Thune said that overruling the parliamentarian would be “akin to killing the filibuster.”

“We can’t go there,” he told Punchbowl reporter Andrew Desiderio. “People need to understand that.”

The same would be true if lawmakers fired the parliamentarian, which last occurred in 2001 under Republican Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott.

As things stand, it’s more likely that Republicans will be forced to strip provisions that don’t comply with reconciliation rules, focusing any package heavily on tax cuts, repealing tax credits, and boosting spending for immigration programs — but potentially angering Trump in the process.

“I think the core of it is going to be probably a multi-year, but not permanent, extension of large parts of the [2017 tax cuts] … with some funding for border and some funding for defense, and maybe a couple of additional tax cuts, like no taxes on tips,” Goldwein said.

With the TikTok ban poised to go into effect in January, President-elect Donald Trump once again waded into the debate over the app’s future this past weekend. 

Trump, who has sounded a much more favorable note on TikTok in the last year, is now calling for the Supreme Court to delay the implementation of a potential ban, which is set to take effect on January 19. In April 2024, Congress passed a law banning “foreign adversary controlled applications” from platforms like the Apple and Google app stores, which would effectively force TikTok’s parent company ByteDance to either sell the app or see it barred in the United States. 

The law received extensive bipartisan support amid national security concerns about surveillance and meddling by the Chinese government, but has been challenged on First Amendment grounds. Prior to Trump’s weekend request, the Supreme Court had already agreed to hear a case about the ban on an expedited schedule and will weigh oral arguments on January 10. 

Now, Trump is urging a pause on the policy so he can have time to find a “negotiated resolution.”

Trump’s recent statement is the latest indication that he’s interested in protecting the app, despite previously backing a ban himself. That change of heart could be due to a slew of factors, including that TikTok offered him a way to reach young male voters during the election — something he has suggested when asked about the ban — and that one of his biggest donors, Jeff Yass, is a major investor in the app’s parent company. Regardless of the rationale, he’s now signaled multiple times that he intends to advocate for the app’s survival. 

“I have a little bit of a warm spot in my heart. I’ll be honest,” he said in mid-December. 

If the Supreme Court upholds the law, there are multiple ways Trump could try to save the app, former Justice Department attorney Alan Rozenshtein told Vox. He notes that the way the policy is written gives the president significant discretion in how it’s interpreted, meaning Trump could direct his attorney general not to enforce the law or even say that ByteDance has divested of the app when it hasn’t. 

Vox sat down with Rozenshtein, who is also a University of Minnesota law professor specializing in national security and tech, to walk through these potential scenarios and how likely each of them is. Broadly, Rozenshtein notes, the president-elect has wide-ranging authority he could use to protect TikTok in some form. 

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Li Zhou

Can the Supreme Court actually pause or delay the law? 

Alan Rozenshtein

Yes, because the Supreme Court can do anything, but they shouldn’t based on existing law.

Li Zhou

Can you elaborate on that? 

Alan Rozenshtein

In order to pause the law, to keep it from coming into force, the general standard is that the person seeking the pause has to show a reasonable likelihood of success on the merits. So it’s not enough just to say, “Hey, this law is coming into effect, please pause it so I can challenge it.” It’s, “I’m probably going to win anyway. So please pause it while I convince you that, in fact, I will win.”

Li Zhou

Trump’s argument is not necessarily that he’d win when it comes to repealing the law. It’s just that he wants time to try to navigate the situation and figure out a different resolution.

Alan Rozenshtein

Yeah, it’s just not how it works. 

Li Zhou

If the Supreme Court decides to overturn the law or pause it — can we expect it to do so prior to the January 19 deadline? 

Alan Rozenshtein

What the Supreme Court could do, and I suspect it will do, and that’s why they timed it this way, is they will do oral argument, they will go back, they will vote. I suspect there will be at least five, if not more, votes to uphold the law. The Supreme Court will announce that immediately, or the next day or two weeks later. And then they will say an opinion is forthcoming.

We will know the answer very quickly. We won’t know the reason for some time. 

Li Zhou

Will users still be able to access the app if a ban goes into effect on January 19? 

Alan Rozenshtein

The law prohibits the app stores from distributing the app, but it does not require the app stores to go into your phone and delete the app. So if you have the app, you have the app. 

The bigger issue is actually around the cloud service provider Oracle. So TikTok runs on Oracle servers in the United States, like when you go to TikTok.com, right? Like the actual machine you’re accessing is owned and operated by Oracle. And so, on January 20, presumably Oracle shuts those computers off because it has to. 

What happens then? Presumably, TikTok, if it thinks it’s about to go dark, will have a contingency plan in place to shift its services from US cloud service providers to global cloud service providers … so there’s all these technical questions.

Li Zhou

The other issue is that if there are no updates to TikTok over time, it eventually becomes unusable and obsolete, right? 

Alan Rozenshtein

That’s the theory.

Li Zhou

If the Supreme Court decides to uphold the law, what are the ways you see Trump being able to step in and save the app? 

Alan Rozenshtein

So number one, he can get Congress to repeal the law. That would obviously be the cleanest and most effective thing he could do, but I doubt that he’ll be able to do it. The law was passed with broad bipartisan consensus. It would require Congress to reverse a vote they had taken not even a year ago, and I just don’t think he has the votes. I don’t think he really wants to spend his political capital on this in his first 100 days. He’s already gonna have trouble getting anything done. 

The second thing he could do is he could direct his attorney general not to enforce the law. The law works by penalizing the app stores and cloud service providers who work with TikTok up to $5,000 per user, and he could just direct [prospective] Attorney General Pam Bondi to not enforce the law. That sort of thing is his constitutional prerogative. But the problem there is that the law would still be in effect, and these companies will still be violating it. So if you’re a general counsel of Apple, and you say, “Hey, I read on Truth Social that Trump is not going to enforce the law,” I’d say definitely don’t bank on that for obvious reasons.

The third thing he could do is declare that the law no longer applies. And the way he could do that is through the provision of the law that defines what a qualified divestiture is. [Editor’s note: As one part of the law reads, “The term ‘qualified divestiture’ means a divestiture or similar transaction that—(A) the President determines, through an interagency process, would result in the relevant foreign adversary controlled application no longer being controlled by a foreign adversary.”]

If you focus on those first few words [of the statute], “the President determines,” that raises some possibilities in terms of how you read the statute. 

[One way] to read it is to say that the statute gives a lot of discretion to the president to determine what counts as a “qualified divestiture.” On that view, the president could — especially if ByteDance shifts the papers around, moves some assets from Company A to Company B, basically gives Trump enough legal cover — to declare, “Well, I no longer think that ByteDance owns TikTok.”

Now, whether or not that’s actually true is a separate question, but it might be difficult to challenge a determination that Trump makes under this provision, even if it’s not actually based on reality. That’s the thing you can do most easily that would be the most effective. 

The fourth thing is he could try to facilitate a sale. Now, the problem has never been on the demand side. It’s not that there aren’t American buyers who wouldn’t happily buy TikTok. It’s on the supply side. [The question is]: will the Chinese government permit ByteDance to sell TikTok with or without the algorithm? So I think it would really be Trump as a diplomat going and trying to strike a deal with [Chinese leader] Xi Jinping. The thing is, I don’t know if Trump can do it. I don’t know if he wants to do it.

Li Zhou

For option three that you laid out, I’m curious: If there was a challenge to Trump making a claim that divestiture has happened but it hasn’t really happened, what would that look like? Where would it come from, and what would the grounds be?

Alan Rozenshtein

So the challenge would say: The statute gives the president some role in determining the divestiture, but it doesn’t allow the president to lie. 

Now, the harder part is bringing the case itself. So there’s a principle in American law called standing, which is that if you want to sue in federal court, at least, you have to be the right kind of person to sue based on the thing you are alleging. So in particular, you have to be concretely and individually injured by something. 

Well, who can be injured, right? So it’s not gonna be just a random person. It’s not Congress. There are two categories I could think of. One is competitors of TikTok, so Mark Zuckerberg could sue, saying, “I own Instagram Reels.” And competitors are allowed to sue when they think the government is illegally benefiting a competitor of theirs, but that would require Zuckerberg to go and sue Donald Trump, and everything we know about Silicon Valley’s current posture is that they don’t want to piss off the president.

The other people that could sue are the affected parties themselves. So Apple and Oracle could sue, not to challenge the divestiture determination, but to clarify, to seek what’s called a declaratory judgment, to clarify the legal obligations. But that still would involve them suing and making it possible that Trump would lose, and that might annoy Trump. So there’s a small universe of people that could sue, and they have other reasons to not necessarily want to sue.

Li Zhou

Theoretically, if one of the parties you mentioned does decide to move forward with a lawsuit, how likely do you see that being a successful case that upholds the law?

Alan Rozenshtein

I think a lot depends on if it’s obvious that Trump just announced a divestiture where nothing had happened. I think the courts would probably strike that down. If ByteDance does some things that plausibly make the case that something like a divestiture has occurred on the margins, I could imagine courts deferring to the president saying, “Look, you know, this question of whether or not TikTok is controlled by a Chinese company is very fact-specific. It implicates national security and foreign policy determinations. Congress gave the president a role, and the president is exercising that role. We’re not going to second-guess that.”

Li Zhou

What do you see as the most likely scenario from here on out?

Alan Rozenshtein

I think the Supreme Court will uphold the law. And then I think through some combination of a sale of something, maybe without the algorithm, plus Trump declaring some stuff, probably there will be something like TikTok that continues [in the US], but exactly in what shape is very unclear.

Editor’s note, December 19, 12 pm ET: Dominique Pelicot, the ex-husband of Gisèle Pelicot, has been found guilty of aggravated rape by a French judge. Dominique had previously confessed to drugging and raping his ex-wife and inviting strangers into their home to rape her. Fifty other men were also found guilty of related crimes.

Read Vox’s Marin Cogan for more on the verdict, and the implications it has for a reckoning over marital rape in France and the US.

A horrifying sexual assault case playing out in France is adding to a larger French reckoning over abuse toward women. 

The case centers on 71-year-old Dominique Pelicot, who is accused of drugging and raping his wife, Gisèle Pelicot, and inviting dozens of other men to sexually assault her while she was unconscious. Dominique Pelicot — who has confessed to raping his wife repeatedly over the course of a decade — is now on trial, along with 50 other defendants, who are also accused of sexual assault or attempted sexual assault. Some of these defendants have admitted guilt, while others have denied it. 

During his testimony, Dominique Pelicot said he and all the men involved are guilty.  “I maintain that I am a rapist, like those in this room,” Dominique Pelicot said. “They all knew her condition before they came; they knew everything. They cannot say otherwise.”

Although she had the option of a private trial, Gisèle Pelicot decided to make the proceedings public in order to support and raise awareness for other victims of similar crimes. “I speak for all women who are drugged and don’t know about it, I do it on behalf of all women who will perhaps never know,” Gisèle Pelicot said of her case. In total, police have used roughly 20,000 images her husband took of the assaults to determine that 72 men had been involved in raping her from 2011 to 2020. 

The Pelicot case is roiling France and comes as the country continues to grapple with accountability regarding sexual misconduct toward women. As the New York Times reported this spring, the Me Too movement had previously stalled in France’s film industry, and has found new momentum this year after prominent actor and director Judith Godrèche spoke out. French writers and actors have also previously noted that the country’s attitudes toward sexual freedom have distinguished it from the US in how condemning sexual misconduct is treated. 

“French attitudes toward morality and sex have historically always been different to the US,” journalist Agnès Poirier previously told the BBC. “But it’s been brewing for years and it feels that 2024 is different.”

What the case is

Dominique Pelicot’s assaults on his wife were first discovered by police in November 2020, after he was initially investigated for taking photos up women’s skirts at a supermarket in southeastern France, where the couple lived. 

After he was caught taking the photos, police searched Pelicot’s computer and found a folder titled “Abuses” on a related USB drive. In it, they discovered thousands of photos and videos of Pelicot and other men raping his wife while she was unconscious. “My world fell apart,” Gisèle Pelicot said after police informed her of their discovery. 

The officers’ findings followed years of Gisèle Pelicot experiencing memory lapses, hair loss, and weight loss, so much so she feared that she might be developing Alzheimer’s or another serious illness. During that time, her husband had been drugging her regularly with a combination of medications, including the anti-anxiety drug Temesta, which can act like a sedative. 

While Gisèle Pelicot was unconscious, Dominique Pelicot invited a number of men to their home so that they could rape her. Gisèle Pelicot has emphasized that she did not have any knowledge of these attacks, and did not feign unconsciousness as some of the defendants have suggested. Dominique Pelicot found the men via a messaging board called “Without their knowledge” on the now-shuttered website Coco, which was known for postings that involved illegal activities. 

On the site, Dominique Pelicot solicited men to assault his wife, giving them specific instructions, including not wearing perfume or smoking, to avoid detection. According to Dominique Pelicot, the men were active participants in the crime: “They came looking for me. I was asked, I said yes. They accepted, they came. I did not handcuff anybody to make them come to my place.”

The identities of these defendants haven’t been revealed, though authorities note that they range from the ages of 26 to 74, that many have partners, and that they come from a wide spectrum of backgrounds, including firefighters, journalists, and soldiers. 

In their search of his computer, police also found naked photos of Dominique and Gisèle Pelicot’s daughter, Caroline Darian; Dominique Pelicot claimed during his testimony that the photos weren’t his and that he believed they were of someone else. 

What’s happened so far

Gisèle and Dominique Pelicot, as well as Darian, all took the stand in recent weeks, and offered harrowing testimony about the assaults. “Frankly, these are scenes of horror for me,” Gisèle Pelicot said of the videos and photos her husband took to document the rapes. “They treat me like a rag doll.”

Prior to learning of the attacks, Gisèle Pelicot had said that she had believed that she and her husband of roughly 50 years had been a close couple. Dominique Pelicot has admitted the abuse and also told a psychologist that he did it because Gisèle Pelicot had rejected swinging, or sleeping with other people outside their marriage. He added during the trial that he believes a sexual assault he says he experienced as a child also contributed to his “perversion.”

Gisèle Pelicot says the decision to release her identity and to speak publicly about the case was intended to show that survivors shouldn’t be ashamed of the abuse they’ve suffered. Handling the case anonymously is “what her attackers would have wanted,” her lawyers said. 

Darian also described the horror she felt upon learning what her father had done, calling him “the worst sexual predator of the last 20 years.” Both emphasized fears that they wouldn’t be able to regain any sense of stability or safety in relationships. “I no longer have an identity. … I don’t know if I’ll ever rebuild myself,” Gisèle Pelicot said. 

The defendants have been charged with aggravated rape or attempted rape, with many facing 20 years in prison if convicted. The trial is set to continue until December as the defendants make their testimony in groups. 

How the case factors into larger movements in France

The Pelicot case is just the latest to raise awareness of sexual abuses in France this year, after multiple cases of sexual misconduct by prominent actors and directors came to light. 

Since February, several high-profile French actresses, including Godrèche, have spoken about being sexually assaulted in their teens by film directors. Notably, Godrèche was invited to make remarks about this problem at the Cesar Awards, the French equivalent of the Oscars, and was received with a standing ovation. 

“After years in which the American #MeToo movement gained traction while in France it languished,” Rokhaya Diallo, a French journalist, wrote of Godrèche for the Washington Post, “this reception signaled that perhaps the larger culture here is finally ready to push back.”

Such shifts come as France has been more resistant to confronting sexual abuses in the same way the US has, with some French commentators dubbing the #MeToo movement the latest extension of puritanical American culture. 

But Godrèche’s speech and the Pelicot case, as well multiple allegations of sexual misconduct against famous French actor Gérard Depardieu, have put a new spotlight on the subject. Women’s rights advocates have also urged lawmakers to add the term “consent” into the legal definition of rape, a move that French President Emmanuel Macron has said he supports. Currently, French law defines rape as “an act of sexual penetration … committed on a person, with violence, coercion, threat, or surprise.”

“While there is still perhaps more skepticism in France than in the US about the legitimacy of sexual assault and sexual harassment, these attitudes are changing fast, especially as a younger generation of women and French feminists and their male allies … are willing to confront these issues head-on,” Laura Frader, a professor of history emerita at Northeastern University who studies gender attitudes in Europe, told Vox. “The Pelicot case is certain to contribute to this trend.”

Update, September 17, 5:15 pm ET: This story, originally published on September 9, has been update with the details of Dominique Pelicot’s testimony.