Sex scandals claim Democrats lawmakers while Republicans brazen it out

NEW DELHI: Al Franken, a popular writer-comedian turned Democratic lawmaker from Minnesota, said on Thursday that he is resigning from the US Senate as America’s predatory sexual behavior scandal began to take a toll of its male elites in politics and entertainment.

Franken announced his resignation on the Senate floor, where Republicans have a 52-48 majority, after female lawmakers from his own party turned on him and asked him to quit. The Democratic male leadership too threw him under the bus, confident the party can retain the seat.

Franken is the second Democratic lawmaker to announce his resignation this week after Congressman

John Conyers

, the longest-serving member of the House of Representatives and the longest-serving African-American congressman in history, stepped down under pressure after several women said he had harassed them, including one who said she was fired for refusing to have sex with him.

Another Democrat, freshman Representative

Ruben Kihuen

of Nevada, is facing calls for his resignation after charges emerged last week that he had repeatedly propositioned his former campaign finance director.

The scandals, part of a nationwide epidemic of aggressive and predatory sexual behavior among male elites being outed by women, are disproportionately claiming Democrats as the party takes the high moral ground while Republicans choose to brazen out charges against them. The GOP is now rallying behind its Senate candidate in Alabama

Roy Moore

, who has been accused of sexually assaulting teenage girls as young as 14, after President Trump backed him despite the allegations.

Trump himself faces allegations of lurid and promiscuous sexual behavior that he has dismissed as locker room talk.

GOP house leaders have also kept mum over reports that a Texas lawmaker used $ 84,000 from a secret taxpayer fund to settle a tawdry sexual harassment case filed against him.

Franken referred to all this an emotional address on the Senate floor. “I, of all people, am aware that there is some irony in the fact that I am leaving while a man who has bragged on tape about his history of sexual assault sits in the Oval Office and a man who has repeatedly preyed on young girls campaigns for the Senate with the full support of his party," he said.

All this amid similar allegations against a raft of prominent figures in the entertainment industry – most of whom are Democrat-leaning liberals – including the actor Kevin Spacey, Harvey Weinstein, and Bill Cosby.

Democrats’ male leadership initially tried the same Republican approach of ignoring charges against one of their own. But earlier this week, New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand broke ranks with a social media post declaring “enough is enough.”

“The allegations against Sen. Franken describe behavior that cannot be tolerated. While he’s entitled to an ethics committee hearing, I believe he should step aside to let someone else serve,” Gillibrand said, after the female senators said they had consulted each other extensively on the matter before deciding that Franken, who has a likeable reputation because of his comedic past, has to go.

She was joined by almost all of her female colleagues including Kamala Harris of California, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii, Claire McCaskill of Missouri, Dianne Feinstein of California, Patty Murray of Washington State, Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, Maria Cantwell of Washington State, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Tammy Duckworth of Illinois and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire.

The male leadership then fell in line. “The Democratic Party will stand up for women and for what is right,” Tom Perez, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said in a statement. “Public service is a public trust. If you are a candidate for office or an elected official who has engaged in sexual misconduct, you should step aside — whether you sit in the U.S. House of Representatives, the U.S. Senate or the Oval Office.”

Of course, no one harked back to Bill Clinton, who survived a torrid sex scandal to serve out two terms as President.