Democrat Senator Ed Markey has been in Congress for 50 years telling Americans he fights for the vulnerable.
His office just co-hosted an event inside the Capitol building that would end his career if his voters saw it.
What two guests said to a room full of Democrat staffers has Washington conservatives furious.
Prostitution Lobbyists Hit Capitol Hill to Trash Police in Front of Democrat Staffers
Roughly a dozen far-left House staffers settled in with coffee and lemonade to hear two self-described prostitutes explain how the "affordability crisis" is hitting the prostitution industry.
The event – "When Sex Work Pays the Rent: A Roundtable Discussion about the Hidden Side of the Affordability Crisis" – was co-hosted by the Congressional Progressive Staff Association, the largest staff association on Capitol Hill with nearly 1,500 members.
Claire Kaufman, a legislative assistant in Senator Ed Markey's office and the group's education director, represented the CPSA at the event.
The speakers were Tamika Spellman, founder of Grammy's Place and a self-described four-decade veteran of drug use and prostitution, and Amber Lashbaugh, a "harm reduction" advocate in recovery.
Spellman went straight at law enforcement.
"Number one is the police, and don't think that they are these kind and gentle watchers of the people, because they're not," Spellman told the staffers. "I have been raped and robbed by them. I have had money extorted from me by them. I've been physically and mentally abused by police."
She also claimed the same cops who arrest prostitutes come to Washington for their annual conferences and hire them – smoking crack and buying sex while back home they vote to criminalize it.
She also made her political allegiance explicit.
"I want to make sure we have a clear understanding about what I look at as a progressive, as a Democratic Socialist," Spellman said, calling for prostitution advocacy to sit at the center of the Democrat agenda.
Sex Workers Used the Capitol to Attack Trumps FOSTA SESTA Sex Trafficking Law
The speakers had a policy agenda, and they did not hide it.
Both attacked the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act and the Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act – the legislation President Trump signed in 2018 that cracked down on online platforms used to facilitate sex trafficking.
The law passed the Senate 97-2 and the House 388-25.
Spellman called the law a tool used only to criminalize prostitutes, complaining it "shut down all of the avenues that we were using to do sex work."
Lashbaugh built her pitch around a standard Democrat talking point – that low wages drive people into prostitution.
"Why don't we pay our teachers enough to live? People are like, why are they turning to OnlyFans?" she asked.
Before attending the event, Lashbaugh had racked up criminal charges and debt. She told the room that prostitution income paid for her Georgetown master's degree.
A third speaker, Kelly Crouch, identifies as a "they/them" and a "recorded Quaker minister." Crouch's nonprofit, Ecumenical Commons, co-hosted the event alongside the CPSA.
This Is What the Democrat Party Looks Like in 2026
Writing this off as a fringe afternoon event would be a mistake.
The Congressional Progressive Staff Association is an official congressional staff organization operating out of the Capitol complex with a formal mission to advance the progressive movement.
An aide on Ed Markey's payroll helped organize it.
The speakers spent the session attacking a federal anti-trafficking law that a Republican president signed with near-unanimous support from both parties – because it cut into their business.
The Democrat Party spent decades telling America it stood for protecting women.
Progressive staffers’ event in the Cannon Office Building is the honest version of that promise.
Sources:
- Jon Levine, "Sex Workers Visit Capitol Hill With a Message for Woke Congressional Staffers," Washington Free Beacon, June 22, 2026.
- "H.R.1865 Actions," Congress.gov, 115th Congress.