The prominent Michigan congressman who illegally forced congressional staffers to be personal servants and work on state and local campaigns is embroiled in a major sex scandal. Various media outlets report that John Conyers, the longest serving House member and ranking Democrat of the powerful Judiciary Committee, secretly settled a sexual harassment claim by an employee with taxpayer funds from his office budget. Additionally, multiple former staff members accuse the 88-year-old lawmaker of repeatedly making sexual advances toward female staff. Democratic colleagues have already called for a House Ethics Committee probe, but there’s little hope Conyers will be punished since the notoriously remiss panel let him off the hook the last time it investigated his corrupt acts, determining that he had “accepted responsibility” for the violations. A former staffer said the legislator, a civil rights icon and founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus, is untouchable.
If you recall, Conyers’ wife, disgraced Detroit City Councilwoman Monica Conyers, served three years in prison for bribery. Now it’s hubby’s turn to be in the scandal limelight. Affidavits filed by four former employees and scrutinized by reputable news outlets, show an alarming pattern of sexual misconduct by Conyers. In the documents the workers say they saw the congressman repeatedly making sexual advances to women on his staff, including touching them inappropriately with leg and back rubs and requesting sexual favors. The woman who received the secret settlement filed a wrongful dismissal complaint in 2014, claiming she was fired for rebuffing the congressman’s repeated sexual advances. In 2015 she was paid $27,000 from Conyers’ taxpayer-funded office budget in exchange for silence. “His office would ‘rehire’ the woman as a ‘temporary employee’ despite her being directed not to come into the office or do any actual work,” according to the document cited in the news report that broke the scandal this week. A law clerk representing the woman described it as a “designed cover-up.”
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