Along their winding route from the federal courthouse in downtown Washington to the National Mall and, finally, to the U.S. Supreme Court, they chanted that they believed Christine Blasey Ford.

They carried handcrafted signs and red posters with “Kava” and “Nope” spelled out on black strips framing the face of Brett Kavanaugh. They chanted that they believed Anita Hill, the law professor whose sexual harassment claims against Justice Clarence Thomas have returned to the fore as Kavanaugh, President Donald Trump’s latest Supreme Court nominee, has denied Ford’s accusations that he sexually assaulted her when they were teenagers.