Herman Cain’s chief of staff, Mark Block, is currently being interviewed on MSNBC. Block says that Cain never sexually harassed anyone. He said he knew nothing about any alleged cash settlements with National Restaurant Association employees complaining about Cain’s behavior.
If the settlements included the standard non-disclosure agreements, parties may hide behind them as a reason to refuse to answer further questions. (Of course, with the alleged incidents in the headlines, they would seem rather moot.) But this is something fairly verifiable. Either the NRA made the payments or they didn’t, and a look at their books during the years in question would clarify whether there was an issue that the organization considered worth allocating money to resolve without further legal incident.
And if there were no payments, the National Restaurant Association wouldn’t be running afoul of any nondisclosure agreements by saying, “There were no payments.” The NRA statement to Politico was:
Please understand that our corporate policy is not to discuss personnel matters (other than to confirm employment and dates of employment) with outside sources, including media. Thus, I must respectfully decline to comment on your questions or any allegations you may be looking into that concern current or former employees of the Association.
In non-harassment-allegation news, Block says Cain is averaging $1.25 million per week in the past month, so he’s taken in roughly $5 million in October.
Chuck Todd asked a couple of questions about his smoking in the Cain web video, and at one point Block said, “We never expected this to go viral the way it did.” While modesty is an undervalued trait in American politics, isn’t that precisely the point of a web video?
UPDATE: The position of the Cain campaign appears to be that they are 100 percent certain that any allegations of sexual harassment from the 1990s are untrue, but that they have no knowledge whatsoever of whether there were legal settlements reached. Claiming absolute certainty and knowledge in one aspect of a matter and absolute ignorance in another aspect is… not reassuring.
As someone who has settled many alleged sexual harassment cases, I can tell you that it is just as likely that a corporation settles for purposes of avoiding subsequent legal expenses as they settle based on culpability. Settlements generally too avoid any message public relations claims whether guilty or not.
As for these thin-sources allegations brought forth by Politico, the claimant in the settlement also has legal obligations in exchange for receiving a cash settlement: namely, confidentiality. So one naturally questions the veracity of these mysterious sources when they may well be in violation of the confidentiality agreement they accepted by signature at the time of settlement.
For Herman Cain, or anyone else vying for the top office in the land, this is a particularly thorny matter. When approached out of the blue with allegations made in the 1990s, one naturally is taken aback. Then, without the benefit of supporting evidence or sources, how should one respond?
Of course the press is going to consider this obfuscation in that he is not obliging them in their foray. But unless and until they are willing to come forth with tangible evidence, and Herman Cain has been afforded the opportunity to refresh any memory of these claims, it is little more than yellow journalism.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseCain must know definitively whether a settlement was made. If a settlement was not made, there would be no reason not to share that information. Dare I say that Block is putting up a smokescreen?
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse1) It is entirely possible that the Legal people told Cain, "Let us handle it," and sent him on his way. Legal in most organizations is almost always interested in being done, not in defending the accused and will, if possible, shove the accused out of the way so they can get things settled.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse2) It is also possible that both Cain and those receiving money signed that they would not discuss it. In that case, Cain is limited in what he can say and may be working with attorneys as to what he can say.
3) Whatever happened, it sounds like a "Here's yoor money, now leave," thing.
Big companies will not disclose anything about a former employee except the hire date and the date they left. You could be dismissed for stealing and the company will not give you that information.
They are too afraid of law suits to comment on anything but the dates you were employed.
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