Brian Schubert, chief of staff for Rep. Neal Dunn (R-Fla.), resigned Wednesday morning following House Ethics Committee launched an exploration into alleged sexual harassment by him and his former boss, Rep. Patrick Meehan.
Meehan, a married Pennsylvania Republican, has announced that she will retire following news reports that he or she used taxpayer money to pay a harassment claim by way of former staffer, as first reported by the The big apple Times in late January.
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But inside a story worthy of a soap opera, Meehan and Schubert, his former chief of staff, were both charged with harassing a similar woman, reported by sources aware of the problem. Meehan let Schubert go in 2016 whilst learned that Schubert expressed an unwanted romantic affinity for the female staffer – merely to make his very own advances on the woman.
The Tallahassee, Fla. station WCTV first reported Schubert’s resignation.
Dunn, a freshman, hired Schubert upon his election in November 2016. It can be unclear whether Dunn knew about harassment allegations in Meehan’s office whilst chose him to have his office.
“Brian Schubert resigned this morning,” Dunn’s office said in the statement. “It is Rep. Dunn’s policy to produce no comments regarding personnel issues.”
The resignation comes the day after the ethics panel opened up an investigative subcommittee to probe both Meehan and Schubert’s treating in excess of. The committee inside of a release said they have to determine if both men “engaged in conduct that constitutes sexual harassment, retaliation, or misuse of official resources, in violation of House Rules, law, regulations, and also other standards of conduct.”
The woman left work after Meehan began treating her adversely upon her rejection of his advances, including declaring inside a love letter they had been a “soul mate.”
Meehan reports he was missing a sexual relationship using the woman, but he did admit to local Pennsylvania newspapers that he had been cold to her upon learning which she was dating another man.