<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The Colorado House voted Friday to expel a Democratic state legislator faced with complaints of sexual harassment filed by five women, including a Democratic colleague.<\/p>\n
Elected in 2012, state Rep. Steve Lebsock was ousted in a 52-9 vote after an emotional six-hour floor debate, then made the stunning announcement that he had changed his party registration from Democrat to Republican immediately before the vote.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
I changed party affiliation at 3:02pm. As I walked down to speak for the last time, approx. 4pm, I handed the minority leader a document with affiliation change. Nothing was planned. He did not know about party change before. #copolitics<\/p>\n
\u2014 Steve Lebsock (@RepLebsock) March 3, 2018<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
The switch was apparently made so that the vacancy would be filled by a Republican rather than a Democrat \u2014 Democrats had led the charge to remove him from office \u2014 although Colorado Democratic Party officials were confident they would ultimately regain the Thornton seat.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs far as Lebsock goes, the Republicans can have him. As far as the seat, we\u2019re looking into it. Either way, we\u2019re confident the district will be represented by a Democrat by the time the next session begins,\u201d said the party in a statement.<\/p>\n
Mr. Lebsock became the first Colorado legislator to be expelled in more than 100 years and the second state lawmaker expelled this year over sexual-misconduct allegations in the wake of the #MeToo movement.<\/p>\n
Last month, the Arizona House voted 56-3 to expel Republican state Rep. Don Shooter after an investigation found he had made \u201cunwelcome sexualized comments\u201d to a number of women.<\/p>\n
At least 14 legislators in 10 states have stepped down in the last year after being accused of sexual harassment, according to the Associated Press.<\/p>\n
A week ago, California state Sen. Tony Mendoza, a Democrat, resigned rather than face an expulsion vote over \u201ca pattern of unwelcome flirtation and sexually suggestive behavior towards several female staff members\u201d and other women, according to the investigation.<\/p>\n
In Colorado, Democratic state Rep. Faith Winter filed a complaint in November against Mr. Lebsock, saying he touched her inappropriately and pursued her aggressively for sex as lawmakers gathered at a bar to celebrate the end of the legislative session in May 2016.<\/p>\n
\u201cI said no, five times. Five times. Not once, not twice, five times,\u201d said Ms. Winter in her floor statement on Colorado Politics. \u201cI used all the tools women have to say no. I laughed it off, I told him to go home to his girlfriend, I said no directly. Nothing worked. Each time I said no he became angrier, he stood closer, he stood over me. I felt unsafe.\u201d<\/p>\n
Two Democratic state legislators said they were so worried about retaliation from Mr. Lebsock that they began wearing bulletproof vests to work several weeks ago.<\/p>\n
Mr. Lebsock fought the sexual-misconduct accusations, releasing the results of a polygraph that he passed and describing some of the allegations as exaggerated or false. He has also argued that his case has not received due process.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur investigations in this body should be held at the very highest standard,\u201d said Mr. Lebsock before the vote. \u201cThis investigation has been anything but a highest standard. In fact it\u2019s been the lowest of standards.\u201d<\/p>\n
The state constitution holds that, \u201cThe person appointed to bill the vacancy shall be a member of the same political party, if any, as the person whose termination of membership in the general assembly created the vacancy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Democrats held a 37-28 majority in the state House, meaning that having Mr. Lebsock\u2019s seat flip to Republican would not affect the balance of power.<\/p>\n
This story was based in part on wire-service reports.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Colorado House voted Friday to expel a Democratic state legislator faced with complaints of sexual harassment filed by five women, including a Democratic colleague. The Colorado House voted Friday to expel a Democratic state legislator faced with complaints of sexual harassment filed by five women, including a Democratic colleague. Elected in 2012, state Rep. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2472,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[34,308],"class_list":["post-2471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national","tag-politics","tag-steve-lebsock"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2471"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2471\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pornvas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}