Maybe she slept with this guy too.
Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris is facing questions over a plea deal her office negotiated during her stint as California’s attorney general that allowed a disgraced former San Diego mayor to avoid registering as a sex offender and dodge prison time.
Harris’ office was reportedly in charge of negotiating a plea deal stemming from allegations of sexual harassment and misconduct against former San Diego Mayor Bob Filner brought by about 20 women in 2013.
According to the Washington Examiner, Harris’s office drew backlash for letting Filner plead guilty to state charges of false imprisonment and battery against three women in exchange for a light sentence.
So rather than spend five years behind bars, Filner got three months of house arrest, three years' probation, and some loss of his mayoral pension.
It's a deal that probably wouldn't be considered acceptable today, critics said.
“The cultural change since #MeToo is having an impact of how prosecutors listen to victims now. I think it all comes down to whether we believe women and how seriously we take these allegations. In serious instances, you need serious consequences,” Maya Raghu, director of workplace equality and senior counsel at the National Women’s Law Center, told the Washington Examiner.
“Powerful people can afford high-profile legal counsel that others don't have access to. People [such as Filner] know how to leverage the system in their favor.”
The plea deal is particularly awkward for Harris, one of the leading presidential candidates, who stressed on the campaign trail the importance of #MeToo movement.
She also slammed departing Labor Secretary Alex Acosta for taking part in the now-infamous Jeffery Epstein 2008 sweetheart plea deal that left the wealthy financier largely unscathed despite the severity of the crimes, saying the plea deal a “simple, very light pat on the hand.”