A Democratic candidate running for a seat in Virginia's House of Delegates had sex with her husband in front of a live online audience and solicited "tips" for specific sex acts.
Susanna Gibson, a mother of two children, streamed herself having sex on Chaturbate, a website that streams live sex and free sex chats, according to the Washington Post. More than a dozen videos posted on the site under her username were archived in Sept. 2022, after she announced her candidacy to run in a highly competitive district in the Richmond area.
Gibson can reportedly be seen soliciting "tips" for performing certain acts requested by viewers, according to the Post. In at least two videos, she reportedly told viewers she is "raising money for a good cause."
She also interrupted her sexual acts to type into a bedside computer and speak directly to the viewers to request "tips," which are paid through icons called "tokens," the Post reported. In two videos, she performed specific acts only in a "private room," which costs extra.
Gibson called the exposure of the videos "an illegal invasion of my privacy designed to humiliate me and my family," the Post reported.
What? You did this publicly. There is no privacy here. If it's public, it's not private. Do you understand that or is that too complicated?
"It won't intimidate me and it won't silence me," she said. "My political opponents and their Republican allies have proven they're willing to commit a sex crime to attack me and my family because there's no line they won't cross to silence women when they speak up."
You committed a sex crime -- prostitution, in fact -- not them.
Her attorney, Daniel P. Watkins, said the exposure of these videos by a Republican operative violates the state's revenge porn law, which makes it a Class 1 misdemeanor to "maliciously" distribute sexual or nude images of another person with the intention to "coerce, harass, or intimidate," according to the Post.
No it doesn't. "Revenge porn" requires that the pictures or videos be given to someone with the promise or expectation that they will be kept confidential. When you're broadcasting to a live audience over the internet, obviously there can be no such expectation. You're giving your porno movie to the world at large.
The seat being contested is an open one and the race is -- was -- considered a toss-up.