Sexual Harassment Claim Ends Woman's Congressional Run

'We are in a national moment where rough justice stands in place of ... due process'
By Michael Harthorne,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 15, 2017 1:42 PM CST
Female Candidate Ends Run Over Sexual Harassment Claim
Democrat Andrea Ramsey has dropped her bid to represent Kansas in Congress after a decade-old accusation of sexual harassment surfaced.   (Faebook)

A first-time candidate in Kansas thinks Democrats may be going too far in trying to remove sexual harassers from the party after she was forced to resign Friday over a 2006 lawsuit accusing her of sexual harassment and retaliation, the Kansas City Star reports. Andrea Ramsey, 56, was one of multiple Democrats set on challenging Republican Rep. Kevin Yoder in 2018. But in 2005, a human resources manager named Gary Funkhouser sued LabOne, where Ramsey was the executive vice president of human resources, claiming she made "unwelcome and inappropriate sexual comments and innuendos" to him, tried to engage him in a sexual relationship during a business trip, and fired him shortly after he turned her down. LabOne and Funkhouser settled the lawsuit in 2006.

Ramsey denies the allegations, which she says came from "a disgruntled, vindictive employee," and wasn't aware of the settlement, which she would have opposed. "I would have fought to exonerate my name," she says. "I never would’ve settled." She says she doesn't remember the business trip and fired Funkhouser because "he wasn't managing his subordinates adequately." Now she says she's being unfairly forced from the race. "We are in a national moment where rough justice stands in place of careful analysis, nuance, and due process," she says. Fox 4 has a lengthy statement from Ramsey announcing the end of her candidacy. In it, she says "the due process that I love, that drew me to the field of law, is totally denied.” (More sexual harassment stories.)

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