Nation's College Athletic Directors Hear from McCaskill in Address

Press Release

The country's college athletic directors today heard directly from U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill at their national convention in Orlando, Florida.

McCaskill, an avid "unfiltered" sports fan and University of Missouri graduate, delivered the convention's keynote address, touching on a range of topics, including efforts to combat sexual violence on campuses. She was introduced at the convention by Mike Alden, the University of Missouri's Director of Athletics.

"I'm proud of my university and all of you who have chosen this noble career of shaping student athletes," said McCaskill, a former courtroom prosecutor of sex crimes and member of the Senate Commerce Committee, which has jurisdiction over college sports. "I know that the vast majority of the work you do is unheralded, and that there are hundreds of thousands of athletes that benefit from your work, guiding them, helping them, encouraging them, turning them in to the kind of young adults that become leaders in this country. Please go from here committed to a value much larger than a won-loss record. And that is the character of your program. Remember, we can all see you. And what you do matters to millions of students that you will never lay eyes on."

McCaskill is helping lead a bipartisan effort in Congress to enact legislation combatting sexual violence on college and university campuses. Last year, she conducted an unprecendented national survey of how universities handle such crimes. Below are McCaskill's remarks, as delivered:

"Good morning. I don't know about you but I'm really going to miss Mike Alden. He has been a terrific leader in my state and at my university and I know he has been a leader in this organization. I am really, really happy to be here to tell you all how much I respect him and his wife Rockie who is also here.

"I want you to know that I am thrilled to be here, and I want to confess to you that coming out of law school, my first choice for a job was actually to be an NCAA investigator. This was right out of law school and it was in the late 70s, December of '77 to be exact, and as you recall at that point and time the NCAA headquarters was in Kansas City.

"So I sent in my resume, hopeful, and went for an interview where I was politely told that it was not a job for a woman.

"In those days there were no NCAA investigators that were women. I was crushed, and in a way it probably boosted my career in the long run because I ended up in the courtroom as an assistant prosecutor trying all kinds of serious felony cases including sexual assault.

"But at the time, I was upset because I'd been an avid, devoted fan my entire life. I was required to know every word to the Missouri fight song before I could go to kindergarten.

"When I was a child growing up in Columbia, Missouri, the daughter of Mizzou graduates--both of them--I was told very plainly all through school that I could go anywhere I wanted to for college, but if I went to Kansas I was on my own. I was also told, as a young child, as my mother would try to get all four of us in the station wagon at the same time, she would shout out that "the last one in the car is a Jayhawk.' We knew that meant we gotta move because what we didn't want to be was a Jayhawk.

"I grew up on the big rock at the M at the end of the stadium and I was there almost every Saturday. I will confess a true story about me, in terms of my entrepreneurial instincts, when I was a child, when I was about nine or ten, I found my dad's playboys in the garage. And for about four or five home games when my parents were away at the game, I figured out a way to tell the neighborhood that they could look at my dad's playboys for a quarter. And we had a line snaking out the back door of our garage down the block during several Mizzou games as the neighborhood kids wanted to take a look.

"When Mike Alden asked me to come talk with you today, I considered it a rare opportunity. An opportunity to hang out with a large group who loves college sports as much as I do. An opportunity to talk with a very powerful group that carries a lot of influence over all aspects of what it means to be a college athlete. An opportunity to remind all of you that you have far more muscle than anyone in Washington or anywhere else when it comes to changing attitudes and cultures on your campuses.

"And maybe even an opportunity to prove I might have made a decent hire after all for the NCAA.

"As you may know, I'm also an unfiltered fan. I've gotten myself into trouble many times with my mouth, I may even do it again this morning.

"I have penned columns blasting a coach's recruiting decisions. And I have put out tweets that have sparked a fury across this country especially among Duke fans, including Rob Lowe when I commented about my personal dislike of "one and done' which, by the way, is a misnomer, as you all know it's "six months and done.'

"But it comes from good intentions. I'm identical to you, I really do care deeply about these programs and I want to do whatever I can to make them the best they can possibly be.

"As we all know, nothing quite unites people like sports because the sports world--and particularly college sports--is such a unifying force. It means the decision on how athletes are treated, handled, rewarded and punished are paid attention to by so many more people. That alone, makes it a world where you must model strong policies that keep the original, primary intentions at heart and set good examples for young people across this country.

"You need to realize that every decision you make reflects on you and your institution in ways that a won-loss record never will. You have to be comfortable knowing that a winning program without character or values is really a losing program.

"The responsibility to truly care about all aspects of these students on and off the field is very important. But keeping that focus for you is no easy task in your incredibly high-pressured world of winning and record-breaking billion-dollar revenue streams. The immense pressure poses daily challenges to so many of you in this room.

"I realize the vast majority of the 450,000 student athletes in this country that you represent are having an amazing experience. It is the outliers that get the most attention, and, as a result, your response to those situations is what is most remembered. It may not be fair, but it's reality.

"The crowd at this convention is very impressive. It cuts a wide swath across all of college athletics. 49 states have someone here and obviously from all different sizes of programs and divisions. You come from careers from all parts of the college sports world.

"You play key roles in changing the culture so that we have good answers to these questions: "Have we fostered a system in which many college athletes, who do not make it to the pros, also end up without a college degree, living on the margins? Does our system still lose sight of the true effect of campus sexual assault and other criminal behavior when it involves a star athlete?'

"I am feeling encouraged recently as I've watched several different organizations and institutions start to make long overdue changes. These changes prove that many of you also agree that a shift in focus may be needed.

"I was happy to see a successful vote on the full cost of attendance at the January NCAA meeting.

"I was encouraged last summer when NCAA President Mark Emmert testified at our Senate Congressional hearing on college athletics. He talked about changing the time demands on student athletes so they could take advantage of internships or study abroad opportunities, all of which prepare them for a career long beyond athletics. He acknowledged that for the vast majority of athletes, their last college game or meet or match is really their last athletic endeavor.

"This past fall schools within some conferences have even made several changes allowing athletes who complete at least 50 percent of their courses and leave a school in good standing to return and earn a degree under the terms of the original scholarship--with the university footing the bill--which is absolutely terrific.

"I appreciate the decision by the NCAA to pay the way for students' families to attend the football title game as well as the men's and women's final four basketball championships.

"And just in the last few weeks--this is a big one--one conference adopted a new policy that will no longer allow schools to accept transfer athletes with histories of domestic and sexual violence.

"And the character of your players has also become a business issue for professional sports leagues. I don't know how many of you have had a chance to review some of the new policies at the NFL, but their new personal conduct policy now considers an athlete's past history with domestic violence or sexual assault--even if it occurred in college--when disciplining an athlete facing a new allegation.

"One of my main disappointments that remains, however, is the earlier and earlier start on recruiting which is especially prevalent in women's sports. It's astounding to me to read all these stories about 14-year-old female middle school students deciding on a college scholarship before they start high school, before they have begun to think about what education they want for a career beyond athletics.

"I have read about coaches lamenting this process: One has said "it's killing us.' Another has said, "I hate it.' And yet to stay up with their competitors they all flock to softball tournaments to scout 8th graders.

"You have the power to clean that up. I certainly urge you to do so.

"Part of what will help everyone make more permanent changes to the entire system, is for us to publicize decisions, all kinds of decisions, from recruiting to who grants multi-year scholarships.

"Keeping what's really happening public is also key as we work to figure out ways to truly combat sexual assault.

"More and more people are beginning to understand that this has been a "dirty little secret' in higher education for a long, long time.

"The secret is especially troublesome in the college sports world when the athletic departments are often the first to know about allegations made against their athletes.

"They rely on the failure of the criminal justice system, which allows them the luxury of looking away.

"An athletic director should not see themselves as a shield to the student athlete. Indeed, the mandate you have when you join your university is an obligation to protect other students and the campus at large.

"As you all know in many college towns--I grew up in one--some of the law enforcement can be co-opted by the athletic department. Consider the work they earn in connection with the team. When they are that closely affiliated with the teams, does their bias come into play?

"In our unprecedented survey of colleges and universities nationwide--and by the way this was a statistically valid survey, it was not anecdotal, it is something you can rely on in terms of its statistical validity because it was comprised, as a former auditor I made sure it was statistically valid--not only did we find that 40% of colleges and universities had not conducted an investigation into sexual assault in five years, which was an astounding reveal, we also found that 22% of Division 1, 2, or 3 schools said their athletic departments had some role in investigating allegations against their athletes.

"When that happens, it's not fair to anyone involved. Let me repeat that: it's not fair to anyone. Not the accused and not the accuser.

"Take this scenario: A student reports a rape to the university police within three hours after she alleged it occurred. Because the incident occurs off-campus, they turn it over to city police. The victim immediately goes--immediately, within hours of when she alleged she was sexually assaulted--goes for a miserable, never to be forgotten, gut wrenching medical exam, where strangers push and probe in ways that is unimaginable in terms of violated a woman's privacy. All done by complete strangers.

"She did not have the ability to identify the assailant that night.

"34 days later the police had still not identified the assailant, the accused. The victim, however, identifies the student on campus and points out who he is and it turns out he is a star athlete.

"The school's athletic department officials learn of the alleged assault, but do not report it to Title IX authorities at their university. Violation of the law.

"Instead, senior athletic officials help the athlete find a lawyer, meet with the lawyer and decide, on behalf of the university, that the allegation did not merit a university investigation--even though such investigation is required by law.

"In the meantime, a detective allegedly warned the victim's attorney that this is a "big football town' and that her life "will be made miserable' if she proceeds with this case. That detective has done a lot of private security work at athletic events.

"66 days after the assault the police close the case without ever interviewing crucial witnesses, without ever interviewing the accused athlete, without getting DNA or phone records from the accused athlete. In addition, the police say the victim stopped cooperating, an allegation that she denies with an excessive amount of passion.

"9 months pass.

"342 days after is the first time investigators interviewed a witness. Investigators then determine that the athlete's DNA matches DNA found on the victim's clothing that was collected and analyzed as part of that intrusive medical exam I mentioned earlier.

"363 days after, the local prosecutor reopened the case after a media inquiry and decided the evidence was not sufficient enough to prosecute. Up until this point, the school has still done nothing as part of its own investigation.

"Nearly two years after the incident, the school finally starts a code of conduct hearing to comply with Title IX.

"The athlete was cleared of violating the school code of conduct, the decision stating "the evidence was insufficient and both sides were credible.'

"He goes on to win the Heisman trophy and became the NFL's No. 1 draft pick. She leaves the university.

"Not only was this case a terrible disservice to the victim because of the utter failure of the police, the athletic department and the university to handle their obligations under the law, it was also terribly unfair to the accused. All of these kinds of cases deserve to be investigated one way or the other. Both parties deserve it.

"In the spring of 2014, I was very proud of my university. After a history that was dotted with some mistakes and serious mistakes as to handling athletes who'd been accused of serious wrongdoing, they were confronted with an allegation against one of our star athletes.

"Dorial Green-Beckham was a star receiver on our team and our athletic department was under immense pressure, as you might remember we had just joined a little conference known as the SEC in football. A lot of pressure to perform, a lot of pressure to win, and DGB was a huge part of that effort.

"Late one night, about 2:30 in the morning, he broke down a door in an apartment building--the facts I'm telling you now are what were in the police report--broke down a door in an apartment building where his girlfriend and her roommate were, and he proceeded--according the police department and what the police were told that night--he proceeded to push one of them down the stairs, drag the other one by their neck.

"The police department--the police report also contained factual information about text messages that night between DGB's girlfriend and her roommate, pleading with her roommate not to go to the police. Talking about what it would do for his career. How important it was that she not pursue any criminal prosecution.

"So this is a fork in the road. My university could have said, "Well there were no criminal charges brought, she didn't come forward, end, done.'

"And by the way, we could have used DGB against Alabama in the SEC championship the next year. But instead, my university did something that they'd not done before. Not because there was a criminal prosecution, but because their investigation told them that there was conduct that didn't fit the values and character of our program, and they dismissed DGB.

"That column I referred to earlier, was me confessing that I wrote a column about the fact that I was proud of my university when they did that and bitterly disappointed when another major coach in college football decided to take him in to their program.

"No longer can or should an athletic program use the decision of a victim or police or prosecutors as an excuse to give an athlete a free pass.

"Title IX requires an investigation, period. In every report of a sexual assault or domestic violence of a student, there must be an investigation, period.

"That independent investigation should be done by trained individuals and athletes found responsible should no longer have the privilege of wearing the uniform. Period.

"I also have an ask for you today. It's a big ask. But I'd like you to give it some thought. Consider going home and writing a letter to your campus police chief, your municipal police chief, and your local prosecutor--asking them to hold your athletes accountable like any other citizen or student. No special treatment, no quiet "heads up' to the coach or athletic director so the athlete has an opportunity to, quote, "get his story straight.' Ask, rather demand, that any violations of the law by your athlete should be done by the book. Then announce your letters to your athletes, your fans, and communities.

"The day must be over where the failure of law enforcement to prosecute--the decision, the difficult decision of a victim not to pursue charges, or the decision of a friendly police officer to look the other way, provides our college athletic programs with a fig leaf to hide behind. The burden on you is not beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law, but what conduct the university investigation uncovers, your program's values, and your own moral compass.

"Putting on that uniform is a privilege in this country. These folks are adored by millions. This is a privilege, it is not a right.

"My many years as a sex crimes prosecutor, our survey, and my work on military sexual assault helped form the premise for my bipartisan bill known as the Campus Safety and Accountability Act. I recently reintroduced the bill this winter after revising it based on feedback we received from nearly 50 Missouri colleges and universities. We really listened to everyone involved: survivors and accused students, colleges and university leaders and administrators, parents, law enforcement personnel, prosecutors and advocates.

"We've now revised the bill, and I think it's much stronger, and it's much smarter, as it provides support to victims and additional due process for the accused. Let me repeat that: and additional due process for the accused.

"It takes huge steps in helping fix a broken system. It provides real accountability and professionalizes the response to and reporting of campus sexual assault. It also has several provisions to give victims the courage to come out of the shadows and hold their perpetrator accountable in a criminal proceeding.

"With this bill, each student who experiences a sexual assault has access to a confidential advisor who can provide guidance and advice regarding how and whether or not she or he would like to come forward and report the assault.

"It also provides new certainty to the accused students, who have in the past been left out of the process, uncertain of the accusation against them or the steps in the investigations, and helpless in many instances, to defense themselves.

"And perhaps of most interest to this group, it establishes that all schools have one uniform process for student disciplinary proceedings, even if the involved students are athletes. I mentioned earlier that my survey found that more than one in five schools involved the athletic departments in some way in investigating or handling complaints involving athletes. This is certainly not appropriate. Under this bill, universities could no longer allow athletic departments or any other department in their university within the school, to handle complaints.

"I feel confident that this legislation is going to pass. We've got a good bipartisan group of Senators that are supporting it. And I have yet to meet a university leader who cannot look back and note how a past mistake or unclear policy ended up re-traumatizing a survivor or someone who has been unjustly accused. And what I have learned is the vast majority of you--in fact 99.9% of you--and others like you that serve in administrative capacities across this country in higher education, want to do the right thing.

"Still, I want to remind everyone how complicated this issue is--especially to try to get working solutions on college campuses. On campuses, in particular, we're dealing with two systems with two very different goals.

"Title IX: While it's there for the redress of victims, it is there primarily--it's there primarily to force campuses to provide a safe, crime-free, and discrimination-free campus.

"And the criminal justice system: Its purpose is much different. Its purpose is to prosecute perpetrators, hold them accountable, and hopefully put them in prison.

"One of the most difficult jobs is making sure everyone understands the difference between the two. How they're alike, how they're different, how they overlap, how they don't, how one investigation doesn't necessarily mean anything to the other investigation, how a failure to go to the criminal justice system within a certain period of time greatly reduces the ability to pursue criminal charges later, because of evidentiary problems. And even more importantly, how a failure of the criminal justice system to respond to a timely complaint jeopardizes any successful resolution of the accusation.

"Video cameras get taped over. Physical examination is not taken to collect evidence. Failure to identify and interview witnesses before they can interact and get their stories straight. All of those things go away as time passes.

"Understanding how these two systems work together is one of the biggest challenges we have. In the past two years, we've made very similar reforms in the military that we are trying to now do with Title IX. With the military, we called for providing a special victims counsel to every person who was accusing someone of sexual assault in the military, much like we're proposing with the confidential advisor on campuses. Our goal when we began the reform within the military on this subject was to have the incidents down, with sexual assault in the military, with the reporting going up. Since as Mike said in the introduction, this is the most underreported crime in America. For reasons that should be painfully obvious to everyone. No one wants to share the most personally painful private moment of their life with the world.

"Since the legislation was passed, we've been very pleased. We did a massive amount of reform in the Uniform Code of Military Justice. After one year of these major reforms being in place, we have seen the incidents drop by 29% over the last two cycles, and it used to be one in twelve victims came forward in the military. We now have that number up to one in four. So reporting is way up in every category, and incidents are down. That's exactly what we'd like to see happen on campuses across this country.

"We're striving to make sure that the information now provided to sexual assault survivors in the military is also available to young men and women who are assaulted on college campuses. We want college students to know what their choices are at the moment of reporting.

"When I went on my Listening Tour last fall, I noticed at some campuses the administrators would stand up and talk about this great program they had. And they would go into some detail. "You know, we have counselors set up here, and we have an app. they can use, and we have an orientation program that we've done,' and they would finish, and I would turn to the students in the room, and I would pick out one of them, and I would say to her: "If you were raped on Friday night, would you know where to go and who to call?'

"And almost invariably, every single one of those students on all of those campuses would say, "we have no idea.'

"So it does no good to set up the process if you don't figure out a way to make sure that it is integrated into your campus, and that the students know about it, and that the students understand what their rights and obligations are as it relates to this. And this gets really complicated with mandated reporting.

"A victim, who is assaulted on a Friday night, needs to know that Friday night, where he or she can go or call for confidential support and reliable information.

"On that Friday night, they have to decide, "Do I tell anyone? And if so who do I tell? And if I am going to tell someone, will they keep my confidence until I'm sure that I'm willing to go further? And will they really know what they are talking about? And can they get me help?'

"If we can answer these questions, victims in America, on every college campus, we will begin to really solve this problem.

"If victims have that kind of information and support, they will feel empowered to move forward to the criminal justice system. The more assaults we can get properly adjudicated the better deterrent it will be for potential assailants.

"All of us have an amazing opportunity right now to make needed changes to a very broken system. We do not--and should not--wait for our bill to pass Congress.

"You don't need an act of Congress to make many of the changes that are embraced in this bill. Some of them you can do even without the approval of your college presidents. The more that you speak up about how important it is for campuses to handle these assaults far differently than they have in the past, the better shot we have for real change, right now.

"You all do incredibly important work that I respect immensely. It's work you should be proud of. Student-athletic programs are integral to higher education in this country. It's America. It's what we do. It's part of our culture.

"I'm proud of my university and all of you who have chosen this noble career of shaping student athletes. I know that the vast majority of the work you do is unheralded, and that there are hundreds of thousands of athletes that benefit from your work, guiding them, helping them, encouraging them, turning them in to the kind of young adults that become leaders in this country. Please go from here committed to a value much larger than a won-loss record.

"And that is the character of your program.

"Remember, we can all see you. And what you do matters to millions of students that you will never lay eyes on.

"Thank you very much for having me."

During a question-and-answer session following her remarks, McCaskill added:

"I certainly encourage all of you who believe this legislation is a balanced and appropriate step, and for all of you, you just need to know what to do. You need to know what you should do and what you can do. And so this legislation will provide a pretty good roadmap of how that should all work. So I would hope that you would go to your Senators and Congressional delegations and tell them you would like to have this roadmap. That you would like to have the clarity that this legislation represents. It would be very helpful if you could do that. In case you haven't noticed, it takes a lot of nerve to come down here and lecture you on anything considering where I work. [laughs] It's not like we've got our act together, right? Believe me I'm painfully aware of you all probably thinking that as I was giving this talk. And so it's hard for us to get things done in Washington for a lot of complicated reasons. Our democracy was not designed for efficiency, it was designed to be glorious and messy, and it's certainly very messy right now. So, nothing would be more powerful I believe, I don't want to tell you, you have more power than college presidents, but athletic directors, particularly at many institutions, I would argue are as powerful--and don't tell the Presidents I said this--but I believe you're probably more powerful in some instances than the Presidents, and I think your support for legislation would be incredibly meaningful to any member of Congress…"

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