OPINION
Anyone can accuse anyone of anything. We ought to admit that before the terrible details begin working on us and we find ourselves certain of things we cannot know. An estranged spouse can lie. So can a political opponent or some passing crank with access to social media. The presumption of innocence is one of the arrangements by which civilization keeps accusation from becoming punishment.
But it belongs principally to the courtroom. It tells the government what it must prove before taking away a person’s liberty. It does not require voters to suspend judgment about someone asking to exercise power over them, or political parties to pretend nothing short of a felony conviction can reveal anything about a candidate’s character. Public office is not something a politician owns until the rest of us prove he has forfeited it. It is something we lend them, usually with less care than we exercise in loaning out jumper cables.
This is worth remembering as we consider former Arkansas Rep. Austin McCollum and Ohio Rep. Max Miller, two politicians accused of domestic abuse. McCollum has resigned from the Legislature but remains the Republican nominee for Benton County judge, partly because Arkansas law apparently offers no easy way for a nominee to remove himself from the ballot at this stage. Miller remains in Congress and intends to seek re-election. Both deny wrongdoing. Their cases are not identical.
In McCollum’s case, there is considerably more than an unsupported accusation. His wife made a contemporaneous report and later filed a sworn petition describing the incident that brought deputies to their home, along with what she says is a history of violence. She alleges McCollum choked her, put her in headlocks, dragged her by the hair, pushed her down stairs and once drove a car into her after she got out during an argument.
Deputies responding to the most recent incident reported blood on McCollum’s arms and legs, unspecified physical evidence on his hands, and injuries to his knuckles consistent with punching someone. He was arrested after officers found probable cause. A judge prohibited him from contacting his wife and temporarily awarded her custody of their two young children pending an Aug. 25 hearing.
As of this writing, formal charges had not been filed, and none of these allegations has been proved in court. They do, however, require a better explanation than the shrug we sometimes give to whatever occurs between a husband and wife after the door closes.
Miller’s case is harder to assess. His former wife has accused him of assaulting her, threatening her with a gun, and abusing their daughter. He denies the allegations, which emerged during an ugly custody dispute, and says he has evidence contradicting them. There are also allegations involving another woman, photographs, court records and an investigation by the House Ethics Committee. Each deserves whatever weight it can bear, which may not be the weight assigned by partisans on either side.
Then there is the blue bunny. Miller’s former father-in-law, Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno, says Miller withheld his 2-year-old daughter’s favorite stuffed animal for 48 hours after a custody exchange, leaving the child unable to sleep. Moreno is hardly a disinterested witness. He is the father of Miller’s accuser and an active participant in a bitter dispute. But he is also a Republican senator who might reasonably wish the whole business would disappear, and he says he fears for his daughter and granddaughter.
The bunny proves nothing about the more serious allegations. It may prove nothing at all. Yet anyone who has known a small child understands what a stuffed animal can mean. Withholding it, if that is what happened, would be a particularly shabby way of causing pain to someone too young to understand why the adults around her have gone to war. It is the gesture of a weak person.
Miller has offered messages showing his former wife invited him to dinner after one of the alleged incidents. Apparently he believes this demonstrates something. Maybe it demonstrates how little those of us outside a damaged marriage understand the accommodations people make to survive. People who live with violence often try to placate the person they fear. They may even love their husband, depend upon him, or want their child to have a father. They may make dinner.
The organizing principle of the He-Man Woman-Haters Club is contained in the abuser’s oldest alibi: Look what you made me do. The man may have the office, the money, the lawyers and the physical advantage, but in his account he remains the helpless party. She provoked him. She lied. She trapped him. She is crazy, vindictive, or politically motivated. Her bruises require context. Her fear proves her instability; her appeasement proves she was never afraid. Whatever happened, she was at least complicit.
These men style themselves as protectors of women and defenders of traditional masculinity, though their version of manhood seems to consist largely of frightening people smaller than themselves. Blocking a bedroom door is not strength. Terrorizing a woman who loves you is not strength. It is macho cosplay performed by men who confuse domination with authority and grievance with innocence.
The latest figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicate that nearly 43.5 million American women and 20.7 million men have experienced physical violence, sexual violence, or stalking by an intimate partner during their lifetimes. Domestic abuse is common enough that we should expect to find it in every occupation. Politics may not produce more abusive men than banking, dentistry or journalism. It does provide the accused ones with elaborate protection.
A politician has lawyers, donors, sympathetic broadcasters and colleagues whose livelihoods may depend upon his continued success. Millions of strangers who understand believing his accuser abets “the other side.” Soon the woman is no longer describing what happened to her. She is part of a partisan conspiracy, while the man with the government office, staff and campaign treasury is the victim of persecution.
The men’s-rights grievance industry was built to receive such stories. It tells powerful men they are the truly dispossessed, that women have weaponized empathy, and accountability is persecution. The accused need not answer to evidence if enough people can be persuaded masculinity itself is on trial.
President Donald Trump expressed the prevailing attitude last year when he complained about domestic incidents being included in crime statistics. “Much lesser things, things that take place in the home, they call crime,” he said. “If a man has a little fight with the wife, they say, ‘This was a crime.’”
A “little fight with the wife” could describe an argument most marriages survive. It can also be the phrase that converts a beating into “a misunderstanding.” An assault that would be recognized as criminal outside a bar becomes murkier in a bedroom.
What should allegations such as these mean for someone seeking office? An unsupported accusation should settle nothing. A conviction would settle a great deal. Between those points lies most of the world, where evidence accumulates unevenly. We should examine contemporaneous reports, physical evidence, photographs, police observations, sworn statements and similar accounts from other people. We should hear the accused man’s answer and allow for the possibility that persuasive evidence may later mean something else. Often the honest conclusion will be that we do not know.
But “we do not know” does not mean “therefore we must give him power.” We may wait, choose someone else, or decide the risk is not ours to assume. The peculiarities of Arkansas election law may keep McCollum’s name on the ballot, but they do not require Benton County voters to regard the allegations as irrelevant. Miller is not owed another term in Congress because no prosecutor has proved his former wife’s account. Both men have the right to defend themselves.
We have the right to remain unconvinced.
Anyone can accuse anyone of anything. That is why accusation alone cannot be enough. But it does not follow that nothing is enough until a cell door closes. Somewhere between credulity and willful blindness lies judgment, and democracy has never promised to do that work for us.
Philip Martin is a columnist and critic for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at pmartin@adgnewsroom.com.
Philip Martin has been a columnist and critic for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette since 1993. In that time, he has won more than 100 regional and statewide journalism prizes, including five Green Eyeshade awards, published six books and released eight albums of original music. He appears weekly on “The Zone” with Justin Acri and D.J. Williams on 103.7 FM in Little Rock.
Support journalism that digs deeper into topics that matter most to Arkansans. Donate today to preserve the quality and integrity of local journalism.
Copyright © 2026, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Inc.
All rights reserved.
This document may not be reprinted without the express written permission of Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Inc.
Material from the Associated Press is Copyright © 2026, Associated Press and may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press text, photo, graphic, audio and/or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium. Neither these AP materials nor any portion thereof may be stored in a computer except for personal and noncommercial use. The AP will not be held liable for any delays, inaccuracies, errors or omissions therefrom or in the transmission or delivery of all or any part thereof or for any damages arising from any of the foregoing. All rights reserved.
Leave a Reply