This is long, but informative and to me, extremely disturbing.
Miriam
The Case of Al Franken
By Jane Mayer, The New Yorker
22 July 19
A close look at the accusations against the former senator.
Last month, in Minneapolis, I climbed the stairs of a row house to find Al
Franken, Minnesotas disgraced former senator, wandering around in jeans and
stocking feet. It was a sunny day, but the shades were mostly drawn. Takeout
containers of hummus and carrot sticks were set out on the kitchen table.
His wife, Franni Bryson, was stuck in their apartment in Washington, D.C.,
with a cold, and he had evidently done the best he could to be hospitable.
But the place felt like the kind of man cave where someone hides out from
the world, which is more or less what Franken has been doing since he
resigned, in December, 2017, amid accusations of sexual impropriety.
There had been occasional sightings of him: in Washington, people mentioned
having glimpsed him riding the Metro or browsing alone in a bookstore; there
was gossip that he had fallen into a depression, and had been seen in a
fetal position on a friends couch. But Franken had experienced one of the
most abrupt downfalls in recent political memory. He had been perhaps the
most recognizable figure in the Senate, in part because hed entered it as a
celebrity: a best-selling author and a former writer and performer on
Saturday Night Live. Now Franken was just one more face in a gallery of
previously powerful men who had been brought down by the #MeToo movement,
and whom no one wanted to hear from again. America had ghosted him.
Only two years ago, Franken was being talked up as a possible challenger to
President Donald Trump in 2020. In Senate hearings, Franken had proved
himself to be one of the most effective critics of the Trump Administration.
His tough questioning of Jeff Sessions, Trumps nominee for Attorney
General, had led Sessions to recuse himself from the investigation into
Russian influence in the 2016 election, and prompted the appointment of
Robert Mueller as special counsel.
As it turns out, Frankens only role in the 2020 Presidential campaign has
been as a figure of controversy. On June 4th, Pete Buttigieg was widely
criticized on social media for saying that he would not have pressured
Franken to resignas had virtually all his Democratic rivals who were then
in the Senatewithout first learning more about the alleged incidents. At
the same time, the Presidential candidacy of Senator Kirsten Gillibrand has
been plagued by questions about her role as the first of three dozen
Democratic senators to demand Frankens resignation. Gillibrand has cast
herself as a feminist champion of zero tolerance toward sexual
impropriety, but Democratic donors sympathetic to Franken have stunted her
fund-raising and, Gillibrand says, tried to intimidate her into silence.
Frankens fall was stunningly swift: he resigned only three weeks after
Leeann Tweeden, a conservative talk-radio host, accused him of having forced
an unwanted kiss on her during a 2006 U.S.O. tour. Seven more women followed
with accusations against Franken; all of them centered on inappropriate
touches or kisses. Half the accusers names have still not become public.
Although both Franken and Tweeden called for an independent investigation
into her charges, none took place. This reticence reflects the cultural
moment: in an era when womens accusations of sexual discrimination and
harassment are finally being taken seriously, after years of belittlement
and dismissal, some see it as offensive to subject accusers to scrutiny.
Believe Women has become a credo of the #MeToo movement.
At his house, Franken said he understood that, in such an atmosphere, the
public might not be eager to hear his grievances. Holding his head in his
hands, he said, I dont think people who have been sexually assaulted, and
those kinds of things, want to hear from people who have been #MeTood that
theyre victims. Yet, he added, being on the losing side of the #MeToo
movement, which he fervently supports, has led him to spend time thinking
about such matters as due process, proportionality of punishment, and the
consequences of Internet-fuelled outrage. He told me that his therapist had
likened his experience to what happens when primates are shunned and
humiliated by the rest of the other primates. Their reaction, Franken said,
with a mirthless laugh, is Im going to die alone in the jungle.
Now sixty-eight, Franken is short and sturdily built, with bristly gray
hair, tortoiseshell glasses, and a wide, froglike mouth from which he tends
to talk out of one corner. Despite his current isolation, Franken is
recognized nearly everywhere he goes, and he often gets stopped on the
street. I cant go anywhere without people reminding me of this, usually
with some version of You shouldnt have resigned, Franken said. He
appreciates the support, but such comments torment him about his departure
from the Senate. He tends to respond curtly, Yup.
When I asked him if he truly regretted his decision to resign, he said, Oh,
yeah. Absolutely. He wishes that he had appeared before a Senate Ethics
Committee hearing, as he had requested, allowing him to marshal facts that
countered the narrative aired in the press. It is extremely rare for a
senator to resign under pressure. No senator has been expelled since the
Civil War, and in modern times only three have resigned under the threat of
expulsion: Harrison Williams, in 1982, Bob Packwood, in 1995, and John
Ensign, in 2011. Williams resigned after he was convicted of bribery and
conspiracy; Packwood faced numerous sexual-assault accusations; Ensign was
accused of making illegal payoffs to hide an affair.
A remarkable number of Frankens Senate colleagues have regrets about their
own roles in his fall. Seven current and former U.S. senators who demanded
Frankens resignation in 2017 told me that theyd been wrong to do so. Such
admissions are unusual in an institution whose members rarely concede
mistakes. Patrick Leahy, the veteran Democrat from Vermont, said that his
decision to seek Frankens resignation without first getting all the facts
was one of the biggest mistakes Ive made in forty-five years in the
Senate. Heidi Heitkamp, the former senator from North Dakota, told me, If
theres one decision Ive made that I would take back, its the decision to
call for his resignation. It was made in the heat of the moment, without
concern for exactly what this was. Tammy Duckworth, the junior Democratic
senator from Illinois, told me that the Senate Ethics Committee should have
been allowed to move forward. She said it was important to acknowledge the
trauma that Frankens accusers had gone through, but added, We needed more
facts. That due process didnt happen is not good for our democracy. Angus
King, the Independent senator from Maine, said that hed regretted it ever
since he joined the call for Frankens resignation. Theres no excuse for
sexual assault, he said. But Al deserved more of a process. I dont
denigrate the allegations, but this was the political equivalent of capital
punishment. Senator Jeff Merkley, of Oregon, told me, This was a rush to
judgment that didnt allow any of us to fully explore what this was about. I
took the judgment of my peers rather than independently examining the
circumstances. In my heart, Ive not felt right about it. Bill Nelson, the
former Florida senator, said, I realized almost right away Id made a
mistake. I felt terrible. I should have stood up for due process to render
what its supposed tothe truth. Tom Udall, the senior Democratic senator
from New Mexico, said, I made a mistake. I started having second thoughts
shortly after he stepped down. He had the right to be heard by an
independent investigative body. Ive heard from people around my state, and
around the country, saying that they think he got railroaded. It doesnt
seem fair. Im a lawyer. I really believe in due process.
Former Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, who watched the drama unfold from
retirement, told me, Its terrible what happened to him. It was unfair. It
took the legs out from under him. He was a very fine senator. Many voters
have also protested Frankens decision. A Change.org petition urging Franken
to retract his resignation received more than seventy-five thousand
signatures. It declared, Theres a difference between abuse and a mistake.
***
In recent months, Franken has witnessed a prominent Democrat survive a
similar political storm: this past spring, several women accused Joe Biden
of unwanted kissing or touching at rallies and other political events. Biden
apologized but never stopped campaigning for President. Unlike Biden,
though, Franken was caught on camera. His undoing began with a photograph,
which was released by a conservative talk-radio station on November 16,
2017. The image was taken in 2006, the year before Franken first ran for the
Senate. At the time, he was on his seventh U.S.O. tour, entertaining
American troops abroad as a comedian. The photograph captures him on a
military plane, mugging for the camera as he performs a lecherous pantomime.
Hes leering at the lens with his hands outstretched toward the breasts of
his U.S.O. co-star, Tweeden, who is wearing a military helmet, fatigues, and
a bulletproof vest. Frankens hands appear to be practically touching her
chest, and Tweeden looks to be asleepand therefore not consenting to the
joke.
Some people saw the photograph as a mere gag. Emily Yoffe, writing in The
Atlantic, called the image an inoffensive burlesque of a burlesque. Yoffe,
who has argued that men accused of sexual misdeeds deserve more due process,
noted that Franken and Tweeden were on a U.S.O. tour, which is a raunchy
vaudeville throwback. But the minute the photograph surfaced it went viral,
and condemnation came from both conservatives and liberals. Breitbart, which
loathed Frankens politics, elicited gleeful comments from readers after it
posted a piece from Slate, a liberal publication, headlined Franken Should
Resign Immediately. The article argued that there is no rational reason to
doubt the truth of Tweedens accusations, no legitimate defense of Frankens
actions, and no ambiguity. Sean Hannity, Fox News biggest star, also
quoted the Slate piece, and on his show he interviewed Tweedena friend who
had been a guest on his show dozens of times, often as a booster of the
military. The media uproar was further heightened by an impassioned personal
statement released by Tweedens Los Angeles radio station, KABC-AM, which
provided her account of the story behind the photograph.
The damning image, Tweeden said, was the culmination of a campaign of sexual
harassment that Franken had subjected her to after she had spurned his
advances at the start of the U.S.O. tour, which lasted two weeks. It was
Tweedens ninth U.S.O. gig, but her first with Franken. She alleged that he
had written a skit with a kissing scene expressly for her, telling her,
When I found out you were coming on this tour, I wrote a little scene, if
you will, with you in it. She said that when she saw the script, which
required them to kiss, I suspected what he was after, but I figured I could
turn my head at the last minute.
According to Tweedens statement, after they landed in Kuwait, the tours
first stop, Franken told her, We need to practice the kissing scene. At
first, she said, she blew him off, but he persisted so aggressively that
it reminded me of, like, the Harvey Weinstein tape; Weinstein, she noted,
had been taped badgering a resistant sexual victim. Just five weeks before
Tweeden released her statement, the Times and this magazine had published
allegations accusing Weinstein of serial sexual harassment, assault, and
rape. The resulting outcry had emboldened women across the country to speak
out about their own victimization; online, the hashtag #MeToo emerged.
Tweeden cited these developments as having inspired her to come forward
about Franken.
She wrote that, in 2006, shed initially told Franken that it was
unnecessary to rehearse, saying, Al, this isnt S.N.L. She relented
only so that he would shut up. The rehearsal occurred, she said, in a
makeshift gym behind the stage. When they got to the kiss, Tweeden said, he
just put his hand on the back of my head, and he mashed his face against
it. She went on, He stuck his tongue in my mouth so fastand all that I
could remember is that his lips were really wet, and it was slimy.
Privately, she began thinking of Franken as Fish Lips. She emphasized that
shed fought back: I pushed him off with my hands, and I remember, I almost
punched him. Afterward, her hands instinctively clenched into fists
whenever she saw him. She said that she had warned him that if he ever did
that to me again I wouldnt be so nice about it the next time. Tweeden
said, I was violated.
Tweeden wrote that she never had a voluntary conversation with Franken
again. When they performed the kiss onstage, she said, trust me, he didnt
get close to my face. She said that, because she had felt powerless, she
hadnt reported the assault to the military authorities. She claimed that
she had told a few others on the tour what Franken had done and how I
felt, but her prepared statement provided no names of corroborators.
Franken, she said, repaid me with petty insults for having rejected him.
He doodled devil horns on a head shot of hers. As a final act of reprisal,
Franken demeaned her with the photograph of her sleeping. Tweeden remembered
clearly that the photograph had been taken on the final day of the tour,
Christmas Eve, as we began the 36-hour trip home to L.A. and our C-17
cargo plane took off from Afghanistan.
Tweeden concluded her statement by declaring, Senator Franken, you wrote
the script. But theres nothing funny about sexual assault. She continued,
You knew exactly what you were doing. You forcibly kissed me without my
consent, grabbed my breasts while I was sleeping, and had someone take a
photo of you doing it, knowing I would see it later, and be ashamed.
She said that it wasnt until she returned home and received a CD of images
from the tour photographer that she saw the image of Franken pretending to
grope her while she slept. I felt violated all over again, she said. At
that moment, she had wanted to shout my story to the world, but hadnt
felt secure enough. Now, she said, she wanted other victims of sexual
assault to be able to speak out, adding, I want the days of silence to be
over.
***
Tweeden went public the Thursday before Thanksgiving, while Congress was
wrapping up for the holiday break. At 9:54 a.m., Ed Shelleby, Frankens
deputy chief of staff, was at his desk in the Capitol when he noticed that a
strange e-mail had arrived in an office account. The subject line was
Comment Requested, and the sender was Nathan Baker, the news director at
KABC-AM. The e-mail said that the stations morning drive anchor, Leeann
Tweeden, had written a piece about experiences she had with Senator Franken
while on a U.S.O. tour. It noted, If you have any reaction or comment from
the Senator we would of course include it in our coverage. There was a link
to Tweedens statement and to the photograph, both of which had already been
posted on the Internet. Shelleby called Frankens chief of staff, Jeff
Lomonaco. We gotta get Al! Shelleby said. Weve got this thing!
Franken was in a meeting of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Lomonaco ran
through a series of corridors and pulled him out.
Whats going on? Franken said.
Its important, Lomonaco said.
But I want to vote, Franken protested.
Lomonaco showed him the KABC-AM story and the photograph.
Oh, my God, my life! My life! was Frankens first thought. He remembered the
picture being taken, but he was stunned by Tweedens account. He had thought
that they were on friendly terms. In 2009, she had attended a U.S.O. awards
ceremony, in Washington, honoring him; photographs of the event capture them
laughing together. He had no memory of her having balked at the kissing
scene, and knew that he hadnt written it for her. He had written it in
2003, and performed it on other U.S.O. tours before meeting her.
In Frankens 2017 book, Al Franken, Giant of the Senate, which was
published before Tweedens accusations, he writes of being preoccupied
during the 2006 tour with deciding whether to run for public office. Others
on the trip confirm this, recalling that he spent much of his downtime
studying policy positions with an assistant, Andy Barr. Records show that
Franken had already set up a political-action committee, and he announced
his Senate bid soon after returning home.
Tweeden may well have felt harassed, and even violated, by Franken, but he
insisted to me that her version of events is just not true. He confirmed
that he had rehearsed the skit with her, noting, You always rehearse. The
script, he recalled, called for a man to surprise a woman with a kiss, in
a sort of sudden way, and though Tweeden had read the script, its
possible that in the moment he startled her. Tweeden wasnt an
actressbefore going into broadcasting, she had been a Fredericks of
Hollywood modelso she may have been unfamiliar with rehearsals. But Franken
said, of Tweeden, I dont remember her being taken aback. He adamantly
denied having stuck his tongue in her mouth.
Frankens longtime fund-raiser, A. J. Goodman, a former criminal-defense
lawyer, told me that it was easy to see how it could have grossed Tweeden
out to be kissed by Franken. At the time, Franken was fifty-five, and his
clothes tended toward mom jeans and garish windbreakers. He was like your
uncle Morty, Goodman recalled. He wasnt Cary Grant. But tongue down the
throat? No. Ive done hundreds of events with this guy. Ive been on the
road and on his book tours with him. She said that Franken was five
hundred per cent devoted to Bryson, his wife, whom he met during his
freshman year at Harvard. He can be a jerk, but hes all about his family,
Goodman said. (Franken and Bryson have a daughter, a son, and four
grandchildren.)
In Hollywood, Frankens reputation had been far from wild. According to Doug
Hill and Jeff Weingrads book, Saturday Night, when Franken worked on
S.N.L. he was seen as a stickler and a self-appointed hallway monitor
figure. James Downey, who spent decades writing for the show, told me, of
Franken, Hes lots of things, some delightful, some annoying. He can be
very aggressive interpersonally. He can say mean things, or use other people
as props. He can seem more confident that the audience will find him
adorable than he ought to. His estimate of his charm can be overconfident.
But Ive known him for forty-seven years and hes the very last person who
would be a sexual harasser.
As Franken absorbed Tweedens statement and the photograph, he realized
that, given the recent rise of the #MeToo movement, anyone who wanted to
read the photo as confirming what I was accused of could do that. I
understood that right away. And boomI was instantly in shock.
Franken wasnt the only one. Two actresses who had performed the same role
as Tweeden on earlier U.S.O. tours with him, Karri Turner and Traylor
Portman, immediately recognized that Tweeden was wrong to say that Franken
had written the part in order to kiss her. Both women told me that they
fully supported the #MeToo movement and could speak only to their own
experiences. But Turner confirmed that she had acted in the same skit in
2003. Video footage of her performing it, which can be seen online, shows
that the script was altered for Tweeden only by cutting references to JAG,
a TV show in which Turner starred. In a statement, Turner said that no
woman should have to deal with any type of harassment, ever! But on her two
U.S.O. tours with Franken, she said, there was nothing inappropriate toward
me, adding, I only experienced a person that was eager to make soldiers
laugh.
Traylor Portman, who used her maiden name, Traylor Howard, while appearing
on the TV show Monk, said that she also played the role in Frankens skit,
in 2005. Its not accurate for her to say it was written for her, Portman
told me. She had rehearsed the kissing scene with Franken, and hadnt
objected, because youre going to practicethats what professionals do.
She said that the scene involved what looked like kissing but wasnt,
adding, Its just for comic relief. I guess you could turn your head, but
whateverits nothing. I was in sitcoms. You just play it for laughs.
Portman went on, I get the whole #MeToo thing, and a whole lot of horrible
stuff has happened, and it needed to change. But thats not what was
happening here. She added, Franken is a good man. I remember him talking
so sweetly and lovingly about his wife. Portman recalled, There were
Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders there, and he didnt pay any special attention to
them. He had a good rapport with everyone. He was hilarious. He was just
trying to get them to laugh. It was about entertaining people who were
risking their lives. Asked about the allegation that Franken drew devil
horns on Tweedens head shot, Portman said, It doesnt sound out of line
for himbut please. To get offended by that sounds ridiculous, like fourth
grade.
Frankens claim that he wrote the skit years before Tweedens performance
was also borne out by interviews that he did on NPR in 2004 and 2005. He
described the skit as a throwback to the frankly lascivious U.S.O. sketches
that Bob Hope used to perform with Raquel Welch. The conceit of Frankens
skit is that a nerdy male officer has written a part for a beautiful younger
woman, and she has to audition for it. As she reads aloud from the script,
she grows suspicious but keeps going, eventually reaching the line Now kiss
me! To her disgust, the officer lustily does so. The stage directions in
the 2006 version of the script say Al grabs Leeann and plants a kiss on
her. Leeann fights him off. She then reproaches him, saying, You just
wrote this so that you could kiss me!
Yeah, Frankens character admits. (In videos of the skit, the audience
bursts out laughing.)
The young woman protests, If I were going to kiss anybody here, it would be
one of these brave menor women. Pointing to the audience, she calls a
random soldier onstage, who begins reading from the script. When the soldier
says, Now kiss me!, the stage directions call for a long deep kiss from
Tweeden. In video footage, she seems to be gamely playing the part, setting
off hoots and hollers from the crowd.
It was surreal, Franken told me, that Tweeden had publicly said of him, I
think he wrote that sketch just to kiss me; her language was essentially
borrowed from his skit. Moreover, her fighting him off and expressing anger
had also been scripted by him. But it seemed impossible to relay such
nuances to the press. Explaining that her accusations appropriated jokes
from comic routines that theyd performed together would be as dizzying as
describing an Escher drawing.
The U.S.O. skit didnt end with the kissing scene. In a coda, Franken
appears as a doctor who has just had a cancellation in his appointment
schedule. Tweedens character is informed that a woman your age should have
a complete breast examination every year; Franken then approaches her with
his arms outstretched and his hands aimed at her chest. The script calls for
Tweedens character to protest, Al! At ease! Franken, with a dirty-old-man
nod to the audience, replies, Im afraid its a little too late for that.
The joke was not memorable, yet when Shajn Cabrera saw the 2006 photograph
of Franken on the plane, approaching Tweedens chest with his arms
outstretched, he immediately recalled the Dr. Franken skit. Cabrera had
been on the plane when the photograph was taken. At the time, he was a
special assistant to the Sergeant Major of the Army, who hosts the U.S.O.
tours. I was the one who put the trip together, Cabrera said. Looking at
the photograph, he thought that it was a hundred per cent in line with that
skit when he does the breast exam. The image, he said, was not at all
malicious.
Its understandable that Tweeden objected to Frankens having reënacted the
gag for a photograph while she was asleep. But when she wrote, How dare
anyone grab my breasts like this and think its funny?, she omitted the
fact that she had performed the breast exam bit multiple times. Metadata
from the camera suggests that, contrary to Tweedens statement, the image
was taken not on Christmas Eve, 2006, as a final taunt, but on December
21st. Photographs of a stage performance the previous day show Franken
advancing toward Tweeden with splayed hands as she fends him off with a
script, smiling in a winter coat and a Santa Claus hat.
Consenting to an act onstage is not the same as consenting to an act while
sleeping. Rebecca Solnit, the writer known, among other things, for
identifying the phenomenon of mansplaining, told me, One of the key things
about consent is its not blanket consent. The actor playing Romeo doesnt
get to kiss Juliet offstage because its in the script that they did
onstage.
Yet Bonnie Turner, a writer who worked with Franken on S.N.L., said of
Tweeden, It showed bad faith, and was really wrongheaded of her, not to say
that the skit was something theyd rehearsed and done over and over, night
after night. Cabrera told me that, when he saw the photograph, he felt sure
that Franken had just been goofing around at the time.
Tweeden participated in other ribald U.S.O. skits. In one routine, she tells
the audience that, as a morale booster, she has agreed to have sex with a
soldier whose name Franken will pull from a box, explaining, These are
extraordinary circumstances. The gag is that every name she picks is
Frankens, because hes stuffed the raffle box. In a 2005 U.S.O. show with
Robin Williams, Tweeden jumped into his arms, wrapped a leg around his
waist, and spanked his bottom as he suggestively waved a plastic water
bottle in front of his fly.
Given Tweedens repeated participation in such U.S.O. skits, Cabrera said
that when he first heard about her allegations it was shocking to me. He
noted that all the scripts had been approved by the Army, though he
acknowledged that such humor might now be seen as inappropriate. He never
saw any animosity between Franken and Tweeden, and noted, No complaints
were ever addressed to the Sergeant Major of the Army, and our job was to
make sure everyone was happy.
Though Tweeden has said that she felt too intimidated to complain to those
in charge, she claims that she confided in several other people on the tour.
But she declined to provide any names to me, or to be interviewed for this
story. Two friends, who acted as intermediaries, said that she saw no gain
in reopening the subject, which had exposed her to virulent online attacks.
I spoke with eight participants in the 2006 tour, including Julie Dintleman,
the military escort who was assigned to Tweeden; none observed Tweeden being
upset with Franken. I dont remember anything like that, Dintleman said.
Her assignment was to be almost continually at Tweedens side, except when
the stars went to their quarters for bed down. Todd Tabb, a retired Air
Force pilot who served as Frankens military escort on an earlier U.S.O.
tour, added that, ordinarily, any incident would have been witnessed by a
military officer with the ability to have someone arrested on the spot if
there was an assault. Entertainers were treated carefully so that incidents
did not occur. I was instructed to even go into the rest rooms, so I was
never out of sight of the celebrity. Though he wasnt on the 2006 trip, he
said, I cant imagine how someone wasnt watching when they rehearsed.
Jerry Amoury, who was then a trombone player in the Army band, was onstage
during every show with Franken and Tweeden in 2006, and performed on two
other U.S.O. tours with Franken. Amoury said, of Tweeden, Im not
mitigating what she said, and if someone says something the ethical thing is
to listen. But, based on my experience, it makes no sense. As Amoury
recalls it, Franken directed no inappropriate energy toward Tweeden, and
he observed no tension between them. He said that Frankens humor could be
blunt, but, he added, he was not a lecher, and didnt have a wandering
eye. The photograph of Tweeden, he said, certainly looked sexist out of
context, but in context the whole thing was like being stuck on a smelly
bus. Those planes are loud, there was a wrestler on board, and people were
taking funny pictures. It was campy.
In Tweedens telling, Franken had someone take a photo expressly to
humiliate her. Doug McIntyre, a co-host and confidant of Tweedens at the
radio station, who helped her prepare her public statement, told me, She
alleged that Franken got the Army photographer to take the picture, and put
it on a disk, so her disk had this one extra picture. It was the caboose.
She took it as the final F.U. from Franken. The only person who got it was
her. He said that Tweeden had especially objected to this bullying, and
that Frankens pose in the photograph was no mere joke. A comedian does
jokes for an audience, but this was an audience of one, he said.
This is incorrect. Many people on the trip also received CDs that included
the photograph. Andy Barr, the Franken assistant, received the CD, which I
have seen. He is a pack rat, and kept the original packaging. The mailer,
postmarked January 9, 2007, is stamped Official Business. The return
address is Department of the Army, Office of the Chief of Public Affairs.
The disks label says U.S.O. and its plastic case includes a personal note
from and contact information for Montigo White, an Army photographer on the
trip, who wrote, It was a pleasure to serve with you on the 2006 Tour.
White, now a command sergeant major in the Armys Defense Information
School, declined requests for comment. His wife, reached at their house, in
Alexandria, Virginia, said, Im not confirming or denying that he took the
picture.
Franken recalls the incident that ended his career as lasting a split
second. I remember stepping on the plane, somebody saying, Al, take a
picture, and pointing to Leeann. Pictures taken within a few minutes on
the same camera roll show Franken doing other gags: in one, hes delivering
a mock speech; in another, hes dancing with White, the Army photographer.
It was near the end of what Franken called a bawdy tour. He said, We were
punchy. I was goofing around. Even so, Franken admitted, the photograph of
Tweeden could be seen as having crossed a line. Whats wrong with the
picture to me is that shes asleep, he said. If youre asleep, youre not
giving your consent. When he saw the image that November morning, he said,
I genuinely, genuinely felt bad about that.
Many people who worked in comedy with Franken defended his behavior more
strongly than he did himself. Jane Curtin, who regards him as one of the few
non-sexist men she worked with at S.N.L., said, They were doing a U.S.O.
tour. Theyre notoriously burlesque. The photo was funny because shes
wearing a flak jacket, and hes looking straight at the camera and
pretending hes trying to fondle her breasts. But the humor is he cant get
to themif a bullet cant get them, Al cant get them. James Downey said,
Much of what Al does when goofing around involves adopting the persona of a
douche bag. When I saw the photo, I knew exactly what he was doing. The joke
was about him. He was doing an asshole. Christine Zander, who wrote for
S.N.L. between 1987 and 1993, said, It was a mockery of someone acting in
bad taste, adding, Its so absurd she turned something that was
writtenthese were trunk pieces, old sketchesinto something improvised just
for her. Zander went on, Its tragic. All the women who know him from
S.N.L. and in New York and L.A.thirty-six in allsigned a petition, but
it wasnt enough. She added, It makes you feel terrible and depressed,
especially when there are people running the country who need to be
charged.
Frankens friend Eli Attie, a former speechwriter for Al Gore who moved to
Hollywood to write for The West Wing and other shows, told me, Things
hes done as a comedian look very different through the prism of a senator.
He observed, The comedy world is very different from politics. In writers
rooms, they try to be loose. They say outrageous, unfiltered things. In
politics, you try to censor yourself. Youre always fearful youll offend.
You have to play error-free ball.
***
A big part of Frankens political problem was the way the story broke.
KABC-AM released Tweedens material on its Web site, giving it the look of a
proper news story. In reality, the station, which is owned by Cumulus Media,
was a struggling conservative talk-radio station whose survival plan was to
become the most pro-Trump station in Los Angeles. Three top staffers there
had been meeting secretly for weeks, after hours, with Tweeden to prepare
her statement, but it hadnt been vetted with even the most cursory
fact-checking. Nobody contacted Franken until after the story had been
posted online. The station gave Franken less advance warning than it gave
the Drudge Report, which it tipped off the previous day. After posting the
story, Tweeden embarked on a media tour, starting with a live press
conference and proceeding to interviews with CNNs Jake Tapper (who had been
alerted the previous day), Sean Hannity, and the cast of The View.
Lomonaco, Frankens former chief of staff, said, Typically, reporters will
reach out to you for comment, so you have a heads-up, and some opportunity
to put your best foot forward. But KABC posted it first and only then
reached out to us. It was such an important framing moment. It had the
veneer of a legitimate news story without having to abide by any of the
conventions of journalism.
McIntyre, Tweedens former co-host at the station, told me that he had
bluntly lobbied to give Franken more time to respond but was overruled by
Drew Hayes, the stations operations director, and by Nathan Baker, the news
director, both of whom feared that the story would leak. McIntyre and Baker
confirmed to me that nobody fact-checked Tweedens account. They evidently
didnt ask for the names of the people on the U.S.O. tour whom Tweeden said
she had confided in at the time; in fact, they made no effort to reach
anyone whod been on the trip. They didnt check the date of the photograph,
or look at online videos showing other actresses performing the same role on
earlier tours. They didnt realize that although Tweeden claimed she never
let Franken get near her face after the first rehearsal, there were numerous
images of her performing the kiss scene with Franken afterward. Nor did they
review the script or the photographs showing Tweeden laughing onstage as
Franken struck the same breast exam pose.
The photograph speaks for itself, McIntyre told me. That carried the
day. He explained that, as a local radio station, we didnt have the
investigative tools at hand to vet her account. But he had worked closely
with Tweeden for nine months, and had confidence in the integrity of her
character. She was a trusted employee who had a photograph, he said,
adding, If we didnt trust her, she couldnt have been our news anchor.
McIntyre, who describes himself as a Never Trump Republican, has since left
the station, which, he said, has taken a more pro-Trump position since I
left, as a business decision. Hayes, the operations director, declined to
be interviewed. In 2011, under his management, Trump appeared on the air at
least once; the station also provided an early platform to Steve Bannon. In
2016, according to a well-informed source, Hayes began chastising on-air
talent if they criticized Trump. Hayess Twitter account shows that in 2016
the family Christmas tree was decorated with a crocheted Trump ornament, and
that in 2018 his son had an internship with the Republican National
Committee. Baker, who describes himself as politically independent, has
since left KABC-AM to work as a senior strategist at Madison McQueen, a
conservative media company; among other things, he has helped create ads for
Senator Ted Cruz. While at KABC-AM, he was also a consulting producer with
PJ Media, a hyper-partisan conservative-opinion platform. He told me that,
as KABC-AMs news director, he had felt obliged to contact Frankens office;
at the same time, he didnt want to step on Leeann telling a story that was
very difficult for her.
***
In interviews, Tweeden has described her decision to speak out as torturous.
She has said that she wanted to say something earlier, but people she knew
said, Oh, my God, you will get annihilated and never work in this town
again, and I was afraid. At the time of the 2006 U.S.O. tour, Tweeden was
transitioning from modelling to broadcasting, and she was an on-air
correspondent for Fox Sports Best Damn Sports Show Period. She went on to
host a late-night poker show on NBC.
During those years, Tweeden shared the damning photograph of Franken with a
few good friends, including Hannity. On Super Bowl Sunday in 2005, Hannity
introduced her to his audience as a right-winger who was there to discuss
the game. But he soon asked her how she, as a conservative, could pose
halfway naked on the covers of magazines such as Playboy and FHM. I do it
with the troops in mind, she said, and described how much she enjoyed
signing such photographs for soldiers while doing U.S.O. tours. I want to
be this generations Raquel Welch, she said. By the time of the 2006 U.S.O.
trip, Tweeden had begun referring to Hannity as a friend.
According to McIntyre, Hannity wanted to use the photograph in 2007, when it
would have derailed Frankens first Senate bid. But he deferred to Tweeden,
who feared that, because she had been a lingerie model, her credibility
would be attacked. To Sean Hannitys credit, he never said a word about
it, McIntyre told me. (Hannity, through a spokesperson, praised Tweeden as
patriotic and called Franken literally insane.) McIntyre emphasized that
Tweeden and KABC-AM deliberately chose not to break the story with Hannity,
or on Fox, because they didnt want it to be tainted with charges of
political bias.
There was a history of deep animosity between Fox News conservative hosts
and Franken. Fox sued Franken over his 2003 best-seller, Lies and the Lying
Liars Who Tell Them, which relentlessly disparages the network and its big
star at the time, Bill OReilly. It includes a chapter mocking Hannity as,
among other things, an angry, Irish Ape-man. Franken writes that, after
having a greenroom shouting match with Hannity about Rush Limbaugh, in 1996,
he had never in my life hated a person more. Fox dropped the suit, but
OReilly reportedly threatened vengeance. When Andrea Mackris later sued
OReilly for sexually harassing her while she was a producer at Fox News,
she revealed that, in 2004, OReilly had told her, If you cross Fox News
Channel, its not just me, its Roger Ailesat the time the head of the
networkwho will go after you. . . . Ailes operates behind the scenes,
strategizes and makes things happen so that one day BAM! The person gets
whats coming to them but never sees it coming. Look at Al Franken, one day
hes going to get a knock on his door and life as hes known it will change
forever. That day will happen, trust me. When Tweeden accused Franken, one
of his wifes first thoughts was of OReillys prediction.
Tweeden may have had reasons to worry about how her story would be received.
In the past, she had been accused of making misstatements about her life. In
2002, when she was twenty-eight, she appeared on The Howard Stern Show to
promote her inclusion in FHMs 100 Sexiest Women feature. Stern questioned
a claim, in her official bio, that she had turned down admission to Harvard
University in order to model. At first, Tweeden chatted with Stern about
growing up in Manassas, Virginia, where her father was a mechanic in the Air
Force. She said that she had graduated from high school at sixteen and ran
off with a thirty-year-old guy at seventeen. Stern asked, Didnt you say
you got into Harvard, but you turned it down for modelling? She answered,
Yeah, I was going to go. Stern said, What do you mean you were going to
go? You didnt get in! Tweeden stuck to her story, explaining that her
mother was friends with someone who got the children of celebrities into Ivy
League schoolsand could have secured her a spot, too. Stern asked for her
SAT scores; she said that she couldnt remember them, but guessed that they
were around twelve hundred. You couldnt get into Harvard! he said.
Tweeden insisted, I guarantee you, if I had wanted to, I could,
absolutely. Stern joked, I was going to go to Harvard, but they didnt
want me. I was going to do Pam Anderson last night, too.
Tweeden had also taken some controversial political stands. In 2011, in an
appearance on Hannity, she sided with birthers, calling on President
Barack Obama to produce a birth certificate to prove his citizenship, and
praised Trump, who had been stoking racist suspicions about Obamas
identity. I think Donald Trump is brilliant, she added. Who knows how far
he could go?
In February, 2017, Tweeden was hired as a news anchor on KABC-AMs show
McIntyre in the Morning. That spring, McIntyre mentioned Franken on the
air and noticed that Tweeden flinched. He later asked her about it, and
she said, Lets just say Im not a fan. On October 30, 2017, as the Harvey
Weinstein story was inspiring a torrent of other sexual-harassment
accusations, McIntyre in the Morning did a phone interview with Jackie
Speier, a Democratic representative in California, who said that, as a young
congressional aide, she had been sexually assaulted by a chief of staff; he
had held her face and stuck his tongue in her mouth. During the break,
Tweeden said to McIntyre that this was what Franken did to me. Speiers
allegation, however, involved a boss assaulting a subordinate in an office;
Franken and Tweeden were volunteers performing a scripted kiss, and he had
no supervisory authority over her.
Tweeden had access to the eleven-year-old photograph on her phone, and she
showed it to McIntyre. The picture is what got my attention, McIntyre told
me. Without it, he said, he wouldnt have done the story, adding, It wasnt
sexual assault, or rape, or anything approaching that. It was degradation
and humiliation, and she had proof.
He asked Tweeden if she wanted to go public, warning her that accusing a
political figure would make her fair game. Her husband was in the Air
Force, and they had two small children. McIntyre told me that, a few days
later, Tweeden said that she was ready. (Baker recalled that the preliminary
discussions had gone on for months.)
Tweeden began working through every detail with McIntyre and Baker, and,
later, with Hayes. McIntyre also suggested that Tweeden talk to her friend
Lauren Sivan, a former anchor for the station, who was one of the witnesses
against Weinstein. Sivan had risked her reputation to speak out about
Weinsteins having masturbated in front of her. When Tweeden told her about
Franken, Sivan said to me, the story, it was strangebecause they were
doing it as a skit. She sympathized with Tweeden, whom she described as
having felt mocked and humiliated by Franken. But she wasnt sure how a
public accusation would be received. She suggested that Tweeden take the
story to a mainstream outlet, and even gave her the name of a reputable
reporter. Instead, Sivan told me, Hayes controlled the process, which she
considered a mistake, because its a right-wing conservative radio
station and it seemed like they just wanted to milk the story.
Nevertheless, Sivan said, of Tweeden, it was absolutely something she
wanted to doI think she hated Franken.
A week before Tweeden went public, Roy Moore, the Republican nominee in a
special Senate election in Alabama, was accused of engaging in inappropriate
behavior with several teen-age girls, one of whom was fourteen at the time.
Moore denied the allegations, and Trump, who had endorsed Moore, stuck by
him. But the allegations handed Democrats a wedge issue and put Republicans
on the defensive. Hannity was particularly on the spot: having dismissed
Moores conduct as consensual and mere kissing, he issued a rare on-air
apology.
At the same time that the Republican Party was contending with the scandal,
Franken was rising in prominence, in part because of his deft
cross-examinations of such Trump Administration appointees as Betsy DeVos
and Rick Perry. Bystanders applauded when Franken walked into Washington
restaurants. His latest book had reached No. 1 on the Times best-seller
list. Feminists had welcomed his support of the #MeToo movement, and praised
him for drafting a bill to prohibit mandatory arbitration in
employment-related cases of sexual harassment and discrimination. The
legislation would guarantee women the right to publicly press charges,
rather than submit to secret settlements. He was also praised for supporting
advanced training for law-enforcement officers who dealt with rape victims.
But along with the adulation came detractors. Several far-right news sites
appear to have known about Tweedens story shortly before it broke. In
Southern California, a gossip Web site, Crazy Days and Nights, was contacted
by an anonymous tipster who predicted that Franken was about to get caught
in a sex scandal. There was a link to an online message board where someone
calling himself Sam Spade was claiming that Franken had groped his aunt on
a New York City subway in the nineteen-seventies. (Asked about this, Franken
joked, Ah, yes, Aunt GertrudeI remember her well.) Archives show that
Sam Spade separately posted a message saying that he hoped Al Franken
would die a slow painful death.
At 1 a.m. on November 16th, Roger Stone, the notorious right-wing operative,
announced, on Twitter, Its Al Frankens time in the barrel. Franken next
in long list of Democrats to be accused of grabby behavior. After
Tweedens story was posted, Alex Jones, the extremist radio host, boasted on
his show that Stone had told him, in advance, Get ready. Frankens next.
Stone told me that an executive at Fox who was friendly with Tweeden had
tipped him off.
Sean Hannity exulted when the news broke. Tweeden called in to his radio
show live, and Hannity described her as a longtime friend. Hannity, who,
when Ailes died, celebrated him as one of Americas great patriotic
warriors, pronounced the Franken photograph disgustingand declared that
Franken had been accused of sexual molestation. Trump joined the fray on
Twitter, insinuating that the photograph documented an assault in progress:
Where do his hands go in pictures 2, 3, 4, 5, & 6?
***
Twelve minutes after KABC-AM went on the air with the news, Frankens office
got its first press inquiry, and hundreds soon followed. Shelleby, the
deputy chief of staff, recalls, It was bedlam. No one looked into the
details. There was no way to catch up.
Franken tried to devise a response, but, he told me, he found it impossible
to explain the context of the goofing around everybody had been doing, so I
just said, It was a jokeit wasnt funny, and I apologize. His statement
was lambasted on social media as hopelessly inadequate. He released a
longer, more self-critical apology. But, he told me, I was in shock, and I
wasnt thinking as clearly as I should have. He went on, You feel very
trapped. And the press was just reporting it as she said it.
Norman Ornstein, a political scientist with the American Enterprise
Institute, who is one of Frankens oldest friends, explained that nobody
felt it would be helpful to correct Tweedens inaccuracies, such as
clarifying that the skit had been written years before she and Franken
rehearsed it. You cant start by attacking the accuser, he said. Youll
look like a jerk and probably be a jerk.
Franken thought that the only way to make his case was to appear before the
Senate Ethics Committee. He called for a hearing almost immediately. The
committee can subpoena witnesses and gather documentary evidence. He said,
I knew wed get the photographer and other people on the plane as
witnesses, adding, I felt that the truth would be out. The committee,
which is bipartisan, is often slow and laxin 2018, it received a hundred
and thirty-eight reports of rules violations, and none resulted in a
disciplinary actionbut it was nevertheless an established forum for
weighing such allegations. And Franken, by calling for an independent
investigation into his own conduct, distinguished himself from Trump and
most other recent targets of sexual-misconduct charges. Chuck Schumer, the
Senate Minority Leader, immediately endorsed Frankens request, and the
process was set in motion.
Franken, meanwhile, sent a personal apology to Tweeden, which she read aloud
on The View. He wrote, Theres no excuse, and I understand why you could
feel violated by that photo. I remember that rehearsal differently, but
whats important is the impact it had on youand you felt violated by my
actions, and for that I apologize. When Tweeden accepted the apology, and
said that she wasnt asking him to resign from office, Franken thought that
the worst was behind him.
But Tweedens charges were soon followed by seven additional allegations of
groping or unwanted kisses. A pattern of misbehavior is often crucial to
proving sexual misconduct. Franken told me, My first instinct was This
doesnt make any sense. This didnt happen. But then, when they started
adding up, I said, Well, maybe Im doing something Im not aware of. He
added, But this was out of the blue for me.
His staff, too, was flabbergasted. Franken had many high-level women
advisers, including a chief of staff and a communications director. They ran
his campaigns, did his polling, raised funds, and directed his state office.
Staffers were accustomed to keeping a close eye on Franken, but only because
they feared that his sense of humor might get him into trouble. This had
occasionally happened: in his first campaign, hed barely survived a flap
about a tasteless article that he had once written, for Playboy, about
scientific advances in sex robots. He also made crackssuch as honking More
important than you! as he cut in front of tourists in the Senate security
linethat rubbed some people the wrong way. (In the Senate chamber, though,
Franken was careful to remove jokes from his repertoire, especially during
his first term; he wanted voters to see him as a statesman, not as a
comedian.)
Alana Petersen, his longtime state director, told me that she had trained
Frankens staff to place someone within arms reach whenever he was in
public. These minders took names of potential donors, followed up on
constituents questions, and stood guard against possibly offensive humor.
There was never a single complaint, Petersen said, about mistreatment of
women. And, frankly, I wouldnt have put up with it. All three people who
served Franken as his chief of staff say that they never saw him behave
inappropriately toward women. One of them, Casey Aden-Wansbury, told me,
This was not a case where there was some kind of open secret, as you
sometimes see on the Hill.
There was a related issue, however, where the staff had intervened: Franken
could be physically obtuse. Staffers had told him not to swing his arms so
much when he walked, and to close his mouth when he chewed. Petersen told me
that he had monster hands and sometimes clapped her on the back so hard
that it knocked the wind out of her. When he ate, spittle often flew across
the table. Hes sort of clumsy, Gabrielle Zuckerman, who worked with him
at Air America, the progressive talk-radio network, told me, recalling that
a heavy backpack once caused him to fall off a chair, pinning him on his
back like a turtle. He left the house with his shirt half tucked, and failed
to pick up wet towels when staying with friends. He tended to hug many
people, and kiss some, even on the mouth. It was the New York hello-goodbye
kiss, a longtime adviser told me. The talk-show host Randi Rhodes and the
comedian Sarah Silverman have described Franken as a socialnot a
sexuallip-kisser. Silverman told GQ, He has no sexuality. (Afterward,
Franken sent her a facetious note saying, Thanks a lot.) Nevertheless,
after Franken kissed a female acquaintance on the mouth in 2007, during his
first campaign, an aide from South Dakota, David Benson, took him aside and
said, Dont do that. Really? Franken said. Benson warned him that people
might misinterpret it.
Franken told me that he became more careful after that. Im a very physical
person, he said. I guess maybe sometimes Im oblivious. He added, Ive
been a hugger all my life. When I take pictures, I bring people in close.
He recalled that he often turned people toward the light for a better angle,
reminding me, I used to be in show business. When posing with kids, he
jokingly put them in a headlock. The family would often laugh about it,
Franken said. But once, when he did this in the Capitol, another senator,
Chris Murphy, warned him, That looks like something that will bring joy and
happiness to a thousand familiesuntil it ends your career.
Franken emphasized that hed never heard any complaints about his behavior
toward womennot firsthand, secondhand, or thirdhanduntil the day
Tweedens story broke. Jess McIntosh, who was his spokesperson from 2007 to
2010, said, Ive taken thousands of those photos with him and Ive never
seen any behavior that was questionable. We were together non-stoplike, the
only two people staying in a hoteland nothing happened. I felt completely
comfortable.
To Frankens dismay, he had no memory of any of the alleged accusers except
Tweeden. He had met the seven women long ago, mostly in fleeting
interactions in crowded venues, posing for photographs with them. Only two
incidents were alleged to have happened after Franken was elected to the
Senate. A woman named Lindsay Menz told CNN that, at the Minnesota State
Fair in 2010, her husband had taken a photograph of her with Franken, and
that Franken had grabbed her bottom while posing. She said that the episode
had lasted three to four seconds, and that Frankens hand had been wrapped
tightly around my butt cheek. (Menz didnt respond to requests for an
interview.)
The other claim accusing Franken of misconduct as a senator involved an
inaugural party for Obama, in 2009. A liberal journalist named Tina Dupuy
said that she had asked Franken to pose with her for a photograph. Minutes
later, she posted the image on the Web site FishbowlLA, saying, Totally
stoked. So suck it. Dupuy told me that, despite her apparent excitement at
the time, it had been an upsetting encounter; Franken, she said, had
squeezed her waist in a creepy way for several seconds. It wasnt violent
rape, she acknowledged. But it was, like, Ick! She told the press
that, at the time, she had put on weight, and felt uneasy about her body. A.
J. Goodman, who was with Franken when the photograph was taken, said, She
asked for the picture, put her arm around his shoulderwhat was he supposed
to do? Hows he supposed to know how she feels? Hes not a mind reader.
Sarah Silverman points out that the photo-op allegations, even if true, are
of a different magnitude than the kind of grotesque misconduct that has
often been exposed in the #MeToo era. This isnt Kavanaugh, she said. It
isnt Roy Moore. In fact, one of Frankens photo-op accusers told the
Huffington Post that she voted for him afterward.
Two of the seven accusers were unnamed women who claimed that he had
attempted to kiss them without their consent. Both incidents took place
while he was hosting a comedic political show for Air America. One woman got
an unwanted kiss on the cheek after turning her head to avoid his mouth. The
other sidestepped him.
The first incident occurred on April 28, 2006, in Brattleboro, Vermont,
where Franken was broadcasting a live show at the Latchis Theatre, in front
of seven hundred and fifty people. When a local elected official came
onstage to hand him an award, he kissed her. The woman, whose name is being
withheld at her request, declined to speak to me on the record. But she told
her story, anonymously, to Jezebel, saying that she felt certain Franken had
been aiming to give her a wet, open-mouthed kiss. She told Jezebel, I
felt demeaned. I felt put in my place. She said that, although they were in
a public place, nobody noticed the encounter. But Christian Avard, a local
reporter, witnessed it, and told me, I think it was supposed to be Thank
you very much, but it looked like a bad kiss on his part.
About a week or two before Tweeden stepped forward, the former Vermont
official tried to report Franken to the Boston Globe. The newspaper has
standards requiring #MeToo accusers to be identified or to corroborate their
story through documents and witnessespreferably, people outside their
immediate circle. The Globe deemed the story too weak. After Tweeden came
forward, the woman called KABC-AM, but the station also passed. (McIntyre,
Tweedens former co-host, told me he felt that blind accusations were
unfair.) But, on November 30th, Jezebel ran the womans anonymous account,
citing as corroboration an unnamed sister in whom the former Vermont
official had confided.
Around then, Goodman called Franken and said, Al, just tell meIll always
be with you, no matter what, but I have to know. On the brink of tears, he
told her, Theres nothing!
Jeff Lomonaco, his former chief of staff, said, Ill go to my grave
thinking Al Franken is not a predatory person, adding, It was all very
upsetting, because we all thought the #MeToo stuff was a very important
conversation for the country to be having. Andy Barr said, of Franken, He
is a warm, tactile person, especially when taking pictures, adding that he
could see how this behavior could be misunderstood. Theres a difference
between molesting someone and being friendly. But there may not be a
difference between feeling molested and feeling that someones being
friendly. The only way forward, Frankens staffers decided, was for him to
take responsibility for having made women feel disrespected, while stressing
that he hadnt meant to do so.
The strategy backfired. At a moment when allegations of egregious sexual
misconduct against such men as Harvey Weinstein, Louis C.K., Mark Halperin,
Charlie Rose, Matt Lauer, Russell Simmons, and John Conyers were resulting
in serious repercussions, Frankens statement came off as insufficiently
contrite.
Senate Democrats, meanwhile, were under increasing pressure from the media
and womens groups to explain why they were castigating Roy Moore but not Al
Franken. Many Democrats felt that they needed to distance themselves from
Franken in order to win in Alabama. Joe Trippi, the political consultant to
Doug Jones, the Democrat who eventually defeated Moore, told me that, in
reality, Franken had little bearing on the race. But Washington is its own
ecosystem, and Democratic women in the Senate felt particularly exposed.
They were put on the spot by the media much more than their male colleagues
were, and they feared looking hypocritical. Rebecca Traister, a
writer-at-large for New York, told me, Its obtuse to say Lets have an
investigation and pretend that solves it. Investigations take months.
Meanwhile, women like Kirsten Gillibrand were being grilled on it every
day. As new allegations kept coming, Traister said, Al Franken was letting
his caucus suffer.
On December 1, 2017, seven female Democratic senatorsGillibrand, Kamala
Harris, Claire McCaskill, Mazie Hirono, Patty Murray, Maggie Hassan, and
Catherine Cortez Mastomet with Chuck Schumer to tell him that most of them
were on the verge of demanding Frankens resignation. At least one of them
had already drafted such a statement, and the groups resolve hardened
further when some of its members learned of an impending Politico story that
contained a seventh allegation, by a former Senate staff member. The
accuser, whose name is being withheld at her request, was known to some of
the seven female senators. The woman said that, in 2006, when Franken was
still a comedian, he had made her uneasy by looking as if he planned to kiss
her. The senator she had worked for hadnt known of the allegation at the
time, but vouched for her credibility.
According to someone familiar with the situation, Schumer spoke with Franken
later that day, advising him to take the issue more seriously and to reach
out to the women senators. Franken has no recollection of this conversation,
but says that its wrong to suggest he wasnt already taking the matter
seriously. His plan was still to respond to Tweedens claims at the Senate
Ethics Committee hearing. I was going by the book, Franken told me. We
didnt think we should mount a lobbying campaign. But then it all started
cascading. He faults Schumer for not insisting to his caucus that an
investigation was under way, and that due process required facts before a
verdict. Look, the Leader is called the Leader for a reason, Franken told
me.
On December 6th, Politico posted the story of the anonymous congressional
staffer, under the headline Another Woman Says Franken Tried to Forcibly
Kiss Her. The accuser said that, in 2006, she had accompanied the senator
she used to work for to a taping of Frankens Air America show. The senator
left, and the accuser was gathering her papers when she looked up and saw
Franken practically in her face. He was between me and the door, and he was
coming at me to kiss me, the woman said. It was very quick, and I think my
brain had to work really hard to be, like, Wait, what is happening? But I
knew whatever was happening was not right, and I ducked. According to the
woman, Franken then said, Its my right as an entertainer. Jess McIntosh,
who worked for Emilys List after her years with Franken, and is an
outspoken advocate of womens issues, told me, Theres zero chance he said
he was entitled to kiss someone because he was in show business. Hes not
entitled to anything, as he sees it. What he does say is Sorry, its a
show-business thing, when hes moving someone into the light for a picture,
or if hes made a bad joke. But the portrait of Franken in Politico
reminded some people of Trumps infamous claim, in the Access Hollywood
tape, that celebrities like him could just grab women by the pussy.
Franken told me that it was something I would never do or say. He added,
Maybe it could have been a misunderstanding. If she seemed freaked out or
something, I may have said, Sorry, I was just trying to give you a hug, and
thats what we do in show business. Or something like that. The story
quoted him saying that the accusation was categorically not true, and that
he looked forward to an Ethics Committee hearing. But Franken recalls
thinking, This is really bad. It makes me look like I did something
terrible.
Not long ago, I asked the woman if she thought that Franken had been making
a sexual advance or a clumsy thank-you gesture.
Is there a difference? she replied. If someone tries to do something to
you unwanted? From her standpoint, because she was at worka professional
woman deserving respecthis intentions didnt matter.
Franken has maintained that the womans story was the allegation that
killed me. I asked her if his behavior was bad enough to end his Senate
career.
I didnt end his Senate careerhe did, she said.
Franken was stricken when I related her comments to him. Look, he said.
This has really affected my family. I loved being in the Senate. I loved my
staffwe had fun and we got good things done, big and small, and they all
meant something to me. He started to cry. For her to say that, its just
so callous. Its just so wrong. Rubbing his eyes beneath his glasses, he
said, I ended my career by saying Thanks to herthats what shes
saying.
***
Minutes after Politico posted the story, Senator Gillibrands chief of staff
called Frankens to say that Gillibrand was going to demand his resignation.
Franken was stung by Gillibrands failure to call him personally. They had
been friends and squash partners. In a later call, Gillibrands chief of
staff offered to have Gillibrand speak with Franken, but by that time
Franken was frantically conferring with his staff and his family. Frankens
office proposed that Frankens daughter speak with Gillibrand instead, but
Gillibrand declined.
Gillibrand then went on Facebook and posted her demand that Franken resign:
Enough is enough. The women who have come forward are brave and I believe
them. While its true that his behavior is not the same as the criminal
conduct alleged against Roy Moore, or Harvey Weinstein, or President Trump,
it is still unquestionably wrong, and should not be tolerated.
Minutes later, at a previously scheduled press conference, Gillibrand added
insult to injury: she reiterated her call for Franken to resign while also
trumpeting her sponsorship of a new bill that banned mandatory arbitration
of sexual-harassment claims. She didnt mention that Franken had originated
the legislationand had given it to Gillibrand to sponsor, out of concern
that it might be imperilled by his scandal.
I recently asked Gillibrand why she felt that Franken had to go. She said,
We had eight credible allegations, and they had been corroborated, in real
time, by the press corps. She acknowledged that she hadnt spoken to any
accusers, to assess their credibility, but said, I had been a leader in
this space of sexual harassment and assault, and it was weighing on me.
Franken was entitled to whichever process he wants, she said. But he
wasnt entitled to me carrying his water, and defending him with my
silence. She acknowledged that the accusations against Franken were
different from the kind of rape or molestation charges made against many
other #MeToo targets. But the women who came forward felt it was sexual
harassment, she said. So it was.
Gillibrands call for Frankens resignation triggered an immediate backlash.
Ricki Seidman, a Democratic communications consultant in Washington, who
worked with Anita Hill during Clarence Thomass Supreme Court confirmation
hearings, in 1991, immediately posted a scorching response. As a victim of
sexual assault, you are cheapening my experience by leading a call for
Senator Franken, who has been a champion for women, to step down based on
the flimsy accounts that have come to light to date, Seidman wrote.
Knowing of far worse behavior in the Senate, and FAR worse behavior among
Republicans like Donald Trump and Roy Moore, the fact that you are equating
Senator Franken with them, I find abhorrent and INSULTING to women. Major
Democratic donors, including Susie Tompkins Buell, the co-founder of the
Esprit and North Face clothing lines, who had backed Gillibrand in the past,
also turned against her. Buell told me that Gillibrands move was
opportunistic, adding, It was like a vigilante thing, it was so fast and
so presumptuous. I hope women learn from this. You cant rush to judgment.
You ruin peoples lives.
Gillibrand told me, Id do it again today, adding, If a few wealthy
donors are angry about that, its on them.
Soon after Gillibrand declared that Franken must resign, Senator Murray, who
is in the Democratic leadership, made the same call, sending a signal to
colleagues that the push was coming from the top. The Rhode Island senator
Sheldon Whitehouse, a friend of Frankens, recalls being astonished that
there had been no emergency meeting of the Democratic caucus. A reasonably
organized group of our caucus decided to do this without giving their own
colleagues a heads-up, he said. This was about demanding that a member of
our own caucus resign from the Senate. It was a big deal. From that point
on, he said, it was like a slow-rolling stampede through the day, waiting
to see who would bolt next, with no meeting, no hearing, no process.
Franken asked to meet with Schumer, who suggested talking at his apartment
in downtown D.C., in order to avoid the press. It was like a scene out of a
movie, Franken recalled. Schumer sat on the edge of his bed while Franken
and his wife, who had come to lend moral support, pleaded for more time.
According to Franken, Schumer told him to quit by 5 p.m.; otherwise, he
would instruct the entire Democratic caucus to demand Frankens resignation.
Schumers spokesperson denied that Schumer had threatened to organize the
rest of the caucus against Franken. But he confirmed that Schumer told
Franken that he needed to announce his resignation by five oclock. Schumer
also said that if Franken stayed he could be censured and stripped of
committee assignments.
I couldnt believe it, Franken told me. I asked him for due process and
he said no.
By the end of the day, thirty-six Democratic senators had publicly demanded
Frankens resignation, including Schumer, who had known Franken since they
had overlapped at Harvard. Schumer declined to be interviewed, but sent a
statement: Al Frankens decision to step down was the right decisionfor
the good of the Senate and the good of the country. I regret losing him as a
colleague but given the circumstances, it was inevitable.
***
Franken, his wife, his children, and a group of staff and advisers argued
late into the night about what to do. Shaken, Franken had asked his chief of
staff, Do you think Im this terrible person? His wife wanted to fight on,
but his children worried about his well-being, and everyones biggest
concern was that, if he remained a pariah, he couldnt represent Minnesota
effectively. Franken could have toughed it out like New Jerseys Democratic
senator Bob Menendez, who hung on despite having been indicted on federal
corruption charges, in 2015. (Democrats hadnt demanded Menendezs
resignation, largely because New Jerseys governor at the time was a
Republican and would have appointed a Republican replacement; in Frankens
case, the Minnesota governor was a Democrat.) But Franken decided he had to
resign.
Drew Littman, Frankens first chief of staff, told me, People said he
didnt have to do it, but hes so socialhis nerves are exposed all the
time. It was like going to school and thinking these people are your friends
and they really like you, and then one day they all get together and beat
you up. You dont want to go back to that school after that. Norman
Ornstein, Frankens friend, said, It was no more a choice than jumping
after they make you walk the plank.
The next day, Franken gave a short resignation speech. Gillibrand and other
Senate colleagues flocked to hug him afterward. But Franken told me, Im
angry at my colleagues who did this. I think they were just trying to get
past one bad news cycle. For months, he ignored phone calls and cancelled
dates with friends. It got pretty dark, he said. I became clinically
depressed. I wasnt a hundred per cent cognitively. I needed medication.
Franken feels deeply sorry that he made women uncomfortable, and is still
trying to understand and learn from what he did wrong. But he told me that
differentiating different kinds of behavior is important. He also argued,
The idea that anybody who accuses someone of something is always
rightthats not the case. That isnt reality.
For some activists in the womens movement, Frankens resignation was a
welcome milestone. Linda Hirshman, the author of the recent book Reckoning:
The Epic Battle Against Sexual Abuse and Harassment, told me, Franken
clearly intended to touch these women, and in doing so he violated their
right to bodily integrity. She argues that the Democratic Party has
belatedly made up for having excused Bill Clintons treatment of women,
adding that its finally starting to be the party that protects women from
having their asses grabbed.
Other feminists see the episode as a necessary corrective. Traister, who
thinks that the behavior described in the media qualifies as sexual
harassment, told me, One of the troubling things about this is that there
arent easy answers. When you change rules, you end up penalizing people who
were caught behaving according to the old rules. But if you dont change the
rules they will never change.
The lawyer Debra Katz, who has represented Christine Blasey Ford and other
sexual-harassment victims, remains troubled by Frankens case. She contends,
The allegations levelled against Senator Franken did not warrant his forced
expulsion from the Senate, particularly given the context in which most of
the behavior occurred, which was in his capacity as a comedian. She adds,
All offensive behavior should be addressed, but not all offensive behavior
warrants the most severe sanction. Katz sees Franken as a cautionary tale
for the #MeToo movement. To treat all allegations the same is not only
inappropriate, she warns. It feeds into a backlash narrative that men are
vulnerable to even frivolous allegations by women.
Email This Page
e-max.it: your social media marketing partner