Ethics panel investigating Rep. Hastings over relationship with staffer

The Hill ^ | 11 14 2019 | Cristina Marcos

[yesthatjallen]

The House Ethics Committee revealed on Thursday that it is investigating Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) over whether his relationship with a member of his staff breaks House rules.

Hastings has admitted to being in a relationship with his aide, Patricia Williams, who serves as his deputy district director.

The committee is now investigating whether Hastings violated House rules with that relationship and if he received any improper gifts from that employee.

The House last year adopted a rule preventing members of Congress from having a sexual relationship with a member of their staff.

"The Committee is aware of public allegations arising out of Representative Alcee Hastings’ personal relationship with an individual employed in his congressional office," House Ethics Committee Chairman Ted Deutch (D-Fla.) and the panel's ranking Republican, Rep. Kenny Marchant (Texas), said in a joint statement, without identifying the staffer.

SNIP

[dblshot]

A 83 he takes his Viagra with prune juice. Now he doesn’t know if he’s coming or going.

[CGASMIA68]

POS been just that for years. His constituents are predominantly Black and dont give a crap what he does.
I had the misfortune of doing some data work in his office in the 90’s. Reminded me of a welfare office not a reps office.

[Bonemaker]

“What do you expect from a former Fed Judge who was impeached and convicted for bribery!”

I expect them to be elected to congress as a democrat.

[Flick Lives]

A 83 he takes his Viagra with prune juice. Now he doesn’t know if he’s coming or going.

—

((rimshot))

[Sarah Barracuda]

I give him credit for banging a woman..with Katie Hill boy she was all over the place, banging dudes, banging chicks..all while wearing a nice lil Nazi tattoo..I wonder if she zieg heiled before she spread em

[Sarah Barracuda]

Yeah but Omar is a Muslim jew hater so her behavior is off limits otherwise ya know, islamaphobic

[SunkenCiv]

...investigating Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) over whether his relationship with a member of his staff breaks House rules. Hastings has admitted to being in a relationship with his aide, Patricia Williams, who serves as his deputy district director.

He's admitted the violation, so he should resign, and if he doesn't he should be [redacted] on TV.

[Hugh the Scot]

Whatever it looks like, it’s looked like that for 25 years.

[Liz]

$17,000,000 tax dollars were spent to cover up sexual assault allegations against Congressmen Alcee Hastings----
“I did not know until after the fact that such a settlement was made,” Democrat Hastings said.

BACKSTORY: DEMOCRAT ALCEE HASTINGS ASKED A STAFFER WHAT KIND OF PANTIES SHE WAS WEARING

Winsome Packer

Cong Hastings Record sexual harassment settlement exposes byzantine congressional process
by LEIGH ANN CALDWELL / NBC NEWS

WASHINGTON — With new harassment accusations being revealed on a nearly daily basis in Congress, documents obtained by NBC News from the Hastings case shed light on how taxpayer money ends up being used to essentially sweep such incidents under a bureaucratic rug with little accountability. On Capitol Hill, a sexual harassment complaint is a long process. The documents include drafts of a letter approving the settlement and a confidentiality agreement as well as an internal “lessons learned” memo written by a House employment lawyer. And while many of the accusations and details of the case remain in dispute, the eventual settlement is a case study of a process shrouded in secrecy despite being funded by taxpayers.

In 2011, Winsome Packer, a congressional staffer who worked for the United States Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (known as the Helsinki Commission) filed a complaint against the commission, alleging that its chairman at the time, Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., made unwanted sexual advances toward her and that she was threatened with retaliation. The details of Packer’s specific allegations are recorded in the complaint she also brought in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Publicly filed court documents in that lawsuit show that Packer alleged that she “was forced to endure” repeated “unwelcome sexual advances, crude sexual comments and unwelcome touching” by Hastings. In describing the incidents, Packer alleged that Hastings had hugged her multiple times, sometimes in front of witnesses at public events, pressing his whole body against her, and his face to her face. Packer also claimed that after she complained to the commission’s staff director, she was subject to threats of retaliation by both the director and Hastings himself, including “threats of termination.”

Hastings, who has been in Congress since 1993, has denied Packer’s allegations. He called them “malicious” and “absolutely false” in a letter obtained by NBC News. The Office of Congressional Ethics referred the matter to the House Ethics Committee in 2010. After reviewing more than one thousand pages of documents and interviewing eight witnesses, the committee closed the case after finding that while the congressman admitted to having made some unprofessional comments, it had found “no additional evidence supporting [Packer’s ] allegations.”

The federal court also dismissed the case, with prejudice, in June 2014. Both sides maintain they were wronged. But this case, which took four years to settle, shows the system is so flawed that even Hastings’ House-provided attorney issued a retrospective critical of the process. In an internal congressional document obtained by NBC News this week, Gloria Lett, an attorney for the Office of House Employment Counsel, offered some “lessons learned” from Packer’s case that recommended the adoption of new policies to handle such claims.

So how did Winsome Packer end up getting a $220,000 taxpayer-funded settlement in May 2014? And why was that payment, settling sexual harassment claims against a member of the House of Representatives, not included in a disclosure to the House Administration Committee of all such settlement payments in the last five years, provided by Congress’ Office of Compliance, the congressional office that approved the payment?

The puzzle of a byzantine process starts with what Packer says happened when she first made the complaint. Packer claims that from the outset she faced a system that was onerous and intimidating. In an interview, she told NBC News that the process “is designed to totally demolish you and convince you to drop it.” At the beginning, like any accuser who files a complaint with the Office of Compliance (OOC), Packer paid for her own legal representation while it’s the taxpayers who provide free legal counsel for the member of Congress or the office involved in the complaint. Packer completed an initial requirement of a 30-days-or-less, mandatory counseling period for accusers, and then proceeded to a second requirement of a 30-day mediation period. She called that process “worse than the harassment.” She and one of her lawyers describe an attempt to undermine her credibility and intimidate her. George Chuzi, who represented Packer in her first meeting regarding the complaint, said the House lawyers were “unbelievably aggressive.”

Two government-paid lawyers representing Hastings sat across the table, as did her immediate supervisor. According to Packer and Chuzi, among the first things the House counsel said is that Packer is a “liar and an extortionist.”

Packer added that the House attorneys also made an initial demand: Packer had to quit. Chuzi said he was “in shock” about the treatment of the accuser. Packer continued to press her case in federal court for three years. How Congress is trying to expose sexual harassment payouts

Packer eventually received a settlement payment of $220,000, an amount confirmed by documents reviewed by NBC News and the largest known about since the Congressional Accountability Act was passed in 1995.

[aposiopetic]

Perhaps the lowest and most brazen scumbag in the Congress.

That says a lot.

[upchuck]

‘Bout damned time! Hastings is super slimy.

[Liz]

Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

[highpockets]

He is one of the most honest, fine gentlemen to have ever been impeached.

[EEGator]

“BACKSTORY: DEMOCRAT ALCEE HASTINGS ASKED A STAFFER WHAT KIND OF PANTIES SHE WAS WEARING”

What was the answer?...

[griswold3]

Alec Hastings Member of House of Representatives since 2014 was impeached and removed from the bench Yet here he sits.
Trump is a Shoe - In for 2020

[willk]

“Kamaltoe “Headboard” Harris got a No Show $75,000 a Year Job and all she had do is what comes naturally.”

She was ripped off because Mooshell Obama got $200,000 a year from a hospital just for being married to an Illinois Senator.

[fini]

"He’s 83 years old and banging the help????"

I think that Strom Thurmond still holds the record.

[Liz]

.............she filed a complaint....that was the answer..........

[Berosus]

The next time I make a case for term limitation in Congress, all I will have to do is point to any Democratic Representative who has been in the news lately.

[Reeses]

Kamaltoe “Headboard” Harris got a No Show $75,000 a Year Job and all she had do is what comes naturally.

Her theme song: "They're going to put me in the White House, and all I got to do is act naturally."