RAINN's issue-focused memos provide a comprehensive look at today's most pressing sexual violence issues. Leverage our expert insights to create and advance meaningful legislation that supports survivors of sexual violence and delivers justice to perpetrators.
Deepfakes: Nonconsensual Manipulated Intimate Material
The personal trauma of the nonconsensual use of a victim’s image or voice to create modified explicit material or the distribution of private material can last a lifetime. The harm is repeated every time the material is reproduced...
GET THE MEMO (Updated: June 2025)
Immunity for Sexual Violence Reporting
The focus of any investigation of sexual violence should be on the perpetrator’s disregard of the victim's lack of consent, and not on any of the victim’s possible misdemeanor crimes. Providing immunity for misdemeanor alcohol and drug crimes makes clear that the law prioritizes victims reporting a sex crime and holding a violent offender accountable. Victims are never at fault for assault, regardless of what substances they’ve been involved with...
GET THE MEMO (Updated: June 2025)
Involuntary Pelvic Exams
Especially for survivors of sexual assault, ensuring that medical interactions are transparent and safe protects against retraumatization and avoidance of needed healthcare from fear. Transparency cannot occur without both the comfort and consent of patients and medical trainees...
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Statutes of Limitations for Sex Crimes (Civil)
Survivors of sexual assault cannot access justice in many states. By amending the civil statutes of limitations for sex crimes, your state can begin to show survivors that they are the priority, not the perpetrator...
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Statutes of Limitations for Sex Crimes (Criminal)
We have a responsibility to create a system in which more victims choose to report because they believe it is in their best interest. This will serve states’ overall public safety interests, and support efforts to hold perpetrators of sexual assault—who are often serial criminals—accountable...
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Admissibility of Evidence
Serial rapists continue to evade justice because states prevent juries from hearing about other similar assaults by the same person. The rules of evidence should provide survivors the opportunity to tell their stories, if they are relevant and probative, so that jurors can understand the true nature of the defendant’s criminal conduct. Changing states’ rules of evidence to align with existing federal rules of evidence for sexual assault sends a clear message: survivors are not alone and rapists will not get away.
GET THE MEMO (Updated: June 2025)
Sexual Violence Policy Notification in Schools
Sexual violence happens in schools. In that moment of crisis, survivors do not know what to do. Unfortunately, school policies and any potential resources are hidden deeply in websites, buried in handbooks, or a distant memory of an orientation years in the past. In one case, RAINN spent over 30 minutes looking for a public K-12 school’s sexual violence policy, only to find it on a webpage titled “jobs.” For a student, friend, parent, teacher, or staff member seeking information in a moment of crisis, such inaccessibility and deprioritization of information is unacceptable.
GET THE MEMO (Updated: June 2025)
Immunity for Sexual Violence Reporting
Survivors of sexual assault often fear legal repercussions for alcohol or drug use, preventing them from reporting violent crimes. This fear also emboldens perpetrators, who target individuals under the influence, knowing they're less likely to seek help. When survivors don't report, violent crimes go uninvestigated. Lawmakers can encourage survivors to come forward by extending immunity from prosecution for alcohol and drug use/simple possession for someone seeking to report a sexual offense
GET THE MEMO (Updated: June 2025)
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