Franken faces sex harassment allegation
‘There’s no excuse,’ says U.S. senator
WASHINGTON • U.S. Senator Al Franken faced swift condemnation and bipartisan calls for an ethics investigation on Thursday after a Los Angeles radio broadcaster accused him of forcibly kissing and groping her in 2006.
Franken, a Democrat, first issued a brief apology, saying his actions were intended to be funny and he didn’t recall the incident the way Leeann Tweeden did.
He later issued a longer apology: “There’s no excuse,” he said in a subsequent statement, adding he will “gladly co-operate” with an ethics investigation.
That looks likely to happen.
At least half-a-dozen Senate Democrats urged their chamber’s six-member, bipartisan ethics committee to investigate the allegations. Franken could face censure-ship or even expulsion from the Senate.
“Sexual harassment is never acceptable and must not be tolerated,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement.
The Senate has wide latitude to kick out members, said Cornell law professor Josh Chafetz, though it hasn’t happened since the Civil War. Kicking out a senator would require a twothirds vote by the full Senate — so all 52 Republicans and 15 Democrats.
Other top Democrats, including Franken’s colleague from Minnesota, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, and Sen. Patty Murray of Washington — the highest-ranking female Senate Democrat — urged their colleagues to investigate Franken.
“This should not have happened to Leeann Tweeden,” Klobuchar said in a statement. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who has teamed up with Franken on messaging videos, said his behaviour was “unacceptable and deeply disappointing.”
And Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, who just a day earlier said sexual harassment is a “serious” problem in Congress, said of the allegations against Franken: “This kind of behaviour is unacceptable and should not be tolerated anywhere in our society.”
The allegations against Franken came two days after a House hearing where lawmakers acknowledged that sexual harassment is a pervasive problem on Capitol Hill and proposed legislation to make it easier for victims to report sexual misconduct by lawmakers.
Franken was critical of Hollywood mogul and Democratic donor Harvey Weinstein after numerous actresses accused him of sexual assault.
At the time, Franken said that accusers’ lacklustre responses to their accused leads to a culture of sexual misconduct, and he gave his Weinstein contributions to the Minnesota Indian Women’s Resource Center.
Senate Republicans’ campaign arm immediately tried to make Franken a liability for Democrats, blasting out emails to reporters demanding that vulnerable Democrats up for re-election next year give back money Franken raised for them. Franken won re-election to a second term in 2014 with 53 per cent of the vote. He’s up for reelection again in 2020.
Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who is dealing with political fallout from allegations of sexual misconduct against GOP Senate candidate Roy Moore, also immediately called on the ethics committee to investigate Franken. McConnell has not ruled out similar investigations into Moore if the defiant Christian conservative wins his special election in Alabama next month.
Over the past week, many Democrats have been critical of Senate Republicans for originally hesitating to call for Moore’s ouster. But very few Democrats gave Franken a similar benefit of the doubt, especially given his accuser shared photographic evidence.
In the photo, Franken is posing with his hands over or on Tweeden’s chest as she slept when they were returning from a 2006 USO tour.
Franken would win a hard-fought election to the U.S. Senate two years later.
THIS KIND OF BEHAVIOUR IS UNACCEPTABLE AND SHOULD NOT BE TOLERATED ANYWHERE IN OUR SOCIETY. — UNITED STATES SEN. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND, RESPONDING TO THE ALLEGATIONS AGAINST SENATE COLLEAGUE AL FRANKEN