Candidate apologizes for behavior
A Democratic candidate for Congress in Oklahoma apologized in a television interview Friday after parents complained that she drank and verbally abused children attending a sleepover at a friend’s home this month.
The House candidate, Abby Broyles, a former television investigative reporter who ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in 2020, said that she had no memory of what happened because she had mixed alcohol and a sleep medicine. About eight girls between the ages of 12 and 13 attended the Feb. 11 sleepover, where they watched the movie “Titanic,” according to NonDoc Media, a journalism nonprofit in Oklahoma.
When first contacted by NonDoc Media for comment, Broyles seemed to deny that she was at the party. After a TikTok video showed otherwise, she gave an interview to KFOR-TV, an Oklahoma City station where she once worked. She did not immediately return a message from The New York Times on Monday.
In the interview, Broyles said that she had “blacked out” after drinking wine and taking a sleep medication. She said the medicine was given to her by her friend, whose daughter was having a sleepover when Broyles came to visit.
“I had an adverse reaction,”
Broyles said. “Instead of helping me sleep, I hallucinated. And I don’t remember anything until I woke up or came to, and I was throwing up in a hamper.”
Broyles, 32, who is a lawyer, is seeking her party’s nomination in June to run against Rep. Stephanie Bice, a Republican in her first term representing Oklahoma’s 5th Congressional District. A Democrat has held the seat only once in recent history, and for just two years. The district includes most of Oklahoma City.