The U.S. Senate needs to clean up its own house when it comes to sexual harassment charges, regardless of whether Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore wins his Dec. 12 election, Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt has argued.
Accusations of sexual misconduct against Moore have dominated his campaign. Sexual misconduct claims were also made against Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., who announced his resignation on Dec. 7, and Rep. John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., who stepped down on Dec. 5.
Blunt said he and a few colleagues are trying to improve sexual harassment procedures for charges against members of Congress. He said a requirement that someone who reports harassment by a member of Congress must undergo counseling is “just totally inappropriate.”
That seemed like an uncommon rule, so we wanted to dig into Blunt’s claim.
The standards for investigating employees and members of Congress is a lot different from ones laid out for the public in other states, and the process has come under scrutiny as allegations in Hollywood, politics and journalism have piled up.
Any member or employee of Congress who reports a violation of the Congressional Accountability Act (including sexual harassment) must go through mandatory steps to file a claim. This is known as the Dispute Resolution Process.
Blunt’s statement addresses the first step: counseling. The person reporting sexual harassment must request counseling with the Office of Compliance within 180 days of the alleged harassment.
According to the posted procedures, the counseling period normally lasts 30 days. But it may be reduced at the request of the employee.
Blunt said the counseling process takes 20 hours. We were unable to confirm the number of counseling hours each person receives during the 30-day period.
When we asked Blunt’s office, spokesperson Katie Boyd pointed us to the Office of Compliance.
Laura Cech, the outreach and publications coordinator for the Office of Compliance, did not specify whether Blunt was correct in saying 20 hours. She responded with a Q&A the office developed Nov. 13 outlining "the most common misconceptions" from the media about the process. The first question is about the required "counseling" — but it does not include how the 30-day process translates into hours.
Remaining steps continue after counseling if the employee still believes he or she has been sexually harassed.
Those include a 30-day mediation where both parties are allowed the opportunity to resolve the dispute, administrative hearing or civil action, and the appeals process where the employee can request the final decision be reviewed by the OOC Board of Directors.
Our ruling
According to the Office of Compliance, any employee or member of Congress must go through counseling for a 30-day period before they can continue with further steps of reporting the harassment. However, we were unable to find evidence detailing how many hours the 30-day period includes.
Blunt’s statement is on the right track but needs further clarification with the “hours” claim.
We rate it Half True.
“In the current law, if you report harassment, you’re the one that has to go into 20 hours of counseling before you can decide whether you were really harassed.”
— Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., on Sunday, Nov. 19, 2017 in an interview on “Meet the Press”
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