【Eric Falk】

It was almost 5:30 p.m. ET on Eric FalkFriday. Sen. Susan Collins, once a swing vote, had just announced her plan to confirm Kavanaugh, all but guaranteeing his lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court.

Jess Morales Rocketto, political director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA) -- who you might recognize from a video where she confronted Sen. Ted Cruz with her own sexual assault story -- was on the ground, surrounded by other exhausted, restless protesters.

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"I'm literally sitting on the steps of the Capitol Building as I talk to you," she said on the phone, voice cracking under the weight of a burden too many survivors were made to shoulder throughout the hearing. But there was something else, too.

There was still 24 hours to go before the final vote, and the mood was "raw but defiant." When Kavanuagh's confirmation came Saturday afternoon, Morales Rocketto was prepared for the blow.

Kavanaugh's hearing felt like a re-traumatization for survivors of assault. Survivors heard so much of their own stories in Dr. Christine Blasey Ford's accusation against Kavanaugh and then watched the Senate vote him in 48-50 anyway.

Watching Ford and other protesting survivors be heard then ignored by the Senate on TV and on social media beckoned a sense of powerlessness, one that felt all too familiar for many. But for the activists fighting on the ground, it seems only to have given them newfound vigor.

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"We are not stopping," said Morales Rocketto. "I deeply believe in the promise of America and making this country what I grew up believing it was and still believe that it can be: a place of equality and justice. I wake up every single morning, so I can to bring us closer to that, because that is a calling. That is more than a job. That is more than one protest. And more than one obligation. So tomorrow, I'll do the same thing."

In spite of the "devastation" that the Saturday decision brought her, Morales Rocketto did in fact get up and back to work that day, proposing legislation at the Domestic Workers' Conference and helping at a D.C. rally aimed at mobilizing Kavanaugh protesters to get out the vote for the November midterms.

"And I'll be working to organize the vote in 2020, 2022, in 2024," she said, pausing only to take a breath. "I am very upset. This is very hard. But we were made for this. We were made to fight."

For Kelley Robinson, national organizing director of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Kavanaugh's hearing and confirmation was a turning point the country cannot come back from -- in more ways than one.

"Brett Kavanaugh is unfit to serve on the Supreme Court, and a vote for him was really a vote against abortion, a vote against birth control, a vote against survivors of sexual assault. That's the gravity of the decision that every senator made," she said.

Robinson related the effect of Ford's testimony to Anita Hill's in 1991, when the "Year of the Women" followed with a record-breaking number of them running for office. And now, she said, an even more unprecedented, more all-encompassing wave of diverse candidates will come. After all, Ford testified before 17 male senators and only four women and that dichotomy has hit a nerve.

"Hope is not what I feel right now. But I feel certain that seismic change is coming, and that this is what it feels like to be in the middle ofit," said Robinson. "It's almost like the last stand of an old way of being."

Some political pundits think Kavanaugh's hearing and confirmation delay has reunited the right and reinvigorated Trump's voter base before the midterms. It is impossible to reliably predict our political future (especially now), but for both Robinson and Morales Rocketto, Kavanaugh's victory did quite the opposite.

"They've opened a door that can not ever be closed again. People discovered the power of their own voices, the power of coming together, and what's at stake for women in this country," Robinson said. "We're going to see that impact in November."

But it will take channeling the raw energy that Morales Rocketto saw outside the Capitol.

Senators like Collins, a Republican from Maine, and Joe Manchin, a Democrat from West Virginia, will be made to answer for their pro-Kavanaugh votes, too, she vowed. Long considered swing votes before they confirmed Kavanaugh, the two were the final nail in his appointment.

"Now we're coming for you," Morales Rocketto said. And she advises against them making the mistake of not taking grassroots protest organizations run by women seriously again. A separate online crowdfunding campaign run by Maine activist groups has raised $3.6 million to unseat Collins in 2020.

"At the beginning, they said Kavanaugh's case was a done deal. And what we have done is force people to really show us who they are. And we'll keep doing it," Morales Rocketto said.

The sexual assault charges weren't even what made Morales Rocketto or Robinson start organizing against Kavanaugh, although they reinforced their beliefs that he was unfit to serve. Months before Ford's allegation became public, they were wary of what his vote could do to women's rights on a judiciary level.

As it stands now after his confirmation, Roe v. Wade is in an indisputably dire situation, with 13 potential cases on the cusp of going to the Supreme Court. It's been assumed that Kavanuagh would rule in favor of a case to overturn the historic decision legalizing abortion (with state-level restrictions).

Yet a July Quinnipiac poll of 1,020 voters nationwide shows Americans support Roe, at a record 63 percent.

What's at stake, among other things, is not the existence of abortion (they will happen regardless of legislation), but women's wellbeing across the country. And if Kavanaugh's hearing was just a taste of the fight to come, you can be sure those who've fought to protect Roe have already started organizing for the next skirmish.

Morales Rocketto also pointed to the fact that the battle for Roe v. Wade is far from new to these activist groups. While anti-abortion lobbying has had limited impact on a federal level, several states have made it harder to get abortions.

"Which means that for many women, the reality of Roe v. Wade is that it's already been taken away," she said. "We will need to turn to our sisters who have the experience of what to do in these moments. We need to keep supporting the people who will do anything to be sure that women are safe."

But aside from voting and doing everything in one's power to get people registered to vote, survivors and activists are taking stock of what they've found in one another.

"As much as I've cried in the last couple of months, I've also laughed. I've met people from places that I may never have," said Robinson. "Part of what movement building is about is also finding joy that we all share."

Their rallying cry has become one of unity. Kavanaugh's confirmation formed an all-consuming and ever-shifting wave of anger, exhaustion, hope, grief, and reflection.

"But the wave that continues to move me is the realization of how much we need each other," said Robinson. "I mean that both as a community of support, and also as just a powerful force that's got to change the way our democracy operates."

Over the weekend, the Planned Parenthood Action Fund teamed up with Organizing for Action and Swing Left started knocking on doors for a "Women's Health Day of Action." After the vote, Swing Left also announced a partnership with March On (a subset of the Women's March) for more rallies in November. The Planned Parenthood Federation Fund, while focused on reproductive and women's health, is doubling down as a coalition fighting equally for workers rights, voting rights, people of color, and people with disabilities.

What this experience has shown everyone in more clarity than perhaps ever before is that these are not different battles. It's one fight, with many factions attacking it from different angles.

For the demonstrators on the front lines, they sought a humanity and dignity that might cross party lines.

"When I was talking to Sen. Cruz, I didn't see him as a Republican or a Democrat," said Morales Rocketto. "I didn't think of myself as that either. I thought of myself as a survivor. And I hope he saw me as one, too. Because I was approaching him as someone begging him to listen. And I think that's what all of us have been doing."

Robinson echoed the same sentiment, encouraging women like Morales Rocketto to keep speaking truth to power.

"People have to keep telling their stories about what every issue really means in their lives. Because at the end of the day the things that we're talking about are not political. They're really about people's lives," she said. "We have to get to that layer of humanity back again."