AP finds majority of state legislatures lack public records on harassment

JEFFERSON CITY, MO.» In the past 15 months, dozens of state lawmakers have been forced from office, removed from their leadership roles, reprimanded or publicly accused of sexual misconduct in a mounting backlash against misbehavior by those in power.

Yet the majority of state legislative chambers across the country have no publicly available records of any sexual misconduct claims over the past 10 years. They say no complaints were made, no tally was kept or they do not legally have to disclose it, The Associated Press found.

Some lawmakers and experts on sexual wrongdoing in the workplace say that suggests legislators are not taking the problem seriously.

“There is no good excuse for not making that information available,” said Republican state Sen. Karen McConnaughay of Illinois. “If the voters don’t know these things are going on, then they can’t very well make a judgment about our behavior.”

The AP filed records requests with the legislative chambers in every state — 99 in all — seeking information on the number of sexual misconduct or harassment complaints made against lawmakers since 2008. The requests also asked for any documents pertaining to those complaints and any financial settlements.

That process unearthed roughly 70 complaints from about two dozen states and nearly $3 million in sexual harassment settlements paid by eight states.

But the actual figures almost certainly are higher.

That’s because many states that refused to turn over any information had legislators who had been publicly accused and forced out of office or leadership positions.

The Colorado legislature’s sexual harassment policy exempts complaints from disclosure under open records law but allows the parties involved to share information. And attorneys for the legislature also have refused requests to disclose total numbers of complaints in recent years, making it difficult to determine the extent of the problem and whether it is even tracked.

Some lawmakers and experts say that because of legislatures’ failure to confront the problem aggressively, victims hesitate to come forward for fear of ridicule, isolation and retaliation.

“When you add the pressure of politics and the fact that relationships are everything in politics, it is extremely unusual to imagine anyone ever reporting,” said Maryland Delegate Ariana Kelly, a Democrat who chairs the Legislature’s 60-member women’s caucus. She said she was warned when she entered office eight years ago “that I was going to be a pariah if I didn’t learn to accept the culture the way it was.”

The 188-member Maryland General Assembly said it has no records of the number of sexual harassment complaints over the past decade but plans to begin keeping track. This week, the Legislature passed a bill sponsored by Kelly that will strengthen its policies on harassment reporting to include an independent investigator and to cover lobbyists.