Morning Digest: Ethics Committee recommends censure for GOP congressman over sexual harassment findings

North Carolina's Chuck Edwards was already facing a difficult path to reelection

Republican Rep. Chuck Edwards of North Carolina. (Credit: Chuck Edwards Facebook.)

Leading Off

NC-11

The House Ethics Committee announced on Monday that there was “substantial reason to believe” that Republican Rep. Chuck Edwards, who faces a difficult bid for reelection, “violated House Rules related to sexual harassment and hostile workplaces” and recommended that the full House censure him.

CNN first reported that Edwards was under investigation for alleged sexual harassment at the end of April. Further details soon emerged, including a report from Axios that the congressman had sent a handwritten letter to a young woman on his staff saying she had “written a complex chapter in my heart that I will never stop reading.”

The Ethics Committee confirmed those allegations, concluding in its own report that Edwards had “engaged in persistent unprofessional and inappropriate conduct towards two young female staffers.”

The panel noted that it had found no evidence that Edwards, 65, had “engaged in sexual activity with or explicitly propositioned” either of the women. One had begun working for him at 19 and was still in college at the time of the alleged incidents, while the other was in her early 20s.

However, while the congressman “denied that any of his conduct was intended as a sexual or romantic advance,” the committee determined that “his pattern of behavior would lead a reasonable observer to interpret it as such.”

Among other things, Edwards had given the women multiple expensive gifts, commented on their looks, and invited them to “intimate dinners and vacations.” Those gifts included “jewelry totaling over $1,000, designer purses, guns, shoes, flowers, a laptop and cell phone, KitchenAid mixer, robotic vacuum, vacations, tickets to performances, and one-on-one dinners.”

According to the committee, Edwards would remark that the women looked “pretty” or “breathtaking” and even commented on one aide’s weight. He claimed in response that, on Capitol Hill, “it’s almost an insult if you don’t make some comment about” others’ clothing.

The panel determined that Edwards’ conduct had created a hostile work environment and had damaged morale in his office due to the preferential treatment he showed the two women. The pair both said they left the congressman’s employ because of his behavior, though they gave him other explanations.

The committee’s report specifically upbraided Edwards for continuing to “deny any wrongdoing” and called him out for refusing “to acknowledge the reality of the power imbalance between a Member of Congress and young staffers.”

While Edwards shared many text messages between himself and the two aides with the committee, he omitted many that the panel said were relevant. In one case, Edwards produced a message from one staffer in which she thanked him for bringing her to a work event but did not include his reply, which the committee nonetheless was able to obtain.

“You’re so fun to be with, so easy to talk to, and I love listening to you,” he wrote back. “By all means – let’s explore more of DC together. We seem to have a fondness for many of the same things. Even where we do not, I’ll enjoy the adventure alongside you!”

Because Edwards waived certain procedural rights, the committee was able to immediately recommend that the House pass a resolution censuring the congressman.

If it does, the chamber would formally adopt the committee’s findings, and Edwards would be required to stand in the well of the House while his censure is read aloud by the speaker. Any action, though, will almost certainly need to wait until after the House returns from its summer recess on Aug. 31.

Edwards was elected to the House in 2022 after unseating a fellow Republican who’d grown notorious for his many scandals, Rep. Madison Cawthorn, in part by pitching himself as a hardworking alternative to the attention-seeking incumbent.

Now, though, it’s Edwards whose political career is on the brink. While Republicans carefully gerrymandered western North Carolina’s 11th District, Edwards faces a stiff challenge from Democrat Jamie Ager, whose grandfather, Jamie Clarke, represented the same turf in the 1980s.

Ager has proven to be a strong fundraiser. He took in more than $1.3 million in the second quarter of the year and entered July with almost $2.2 million in the bank. Edwards, by contrast, has seen his fundraising fall off a cliff. He pulled in just $149,000 in the second quarter and had $486,000 in his campaign coffers.

Ager has also received a major vote of confidence from the top Democratic super PAC involved in House races, despite the fact that Donald Trump carried the 11th District 54-45 in 2024. In April, the House Majority PAC announced that it had reserved $4.3 million in fall TV time for the race, while its GOP counterparts have made no similar moves.

And the Democrat got a further boost on Monday before the Ethics Committee released its report when HMP’s nonprofit arm said it was spending $480,000 on TV ads in his district starting this week (see our House Majority Forward item below for more).

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El-Sayed vs. Stevens tops major primary night

Governors

CT-Gov

Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont is going negative ahead of next week’s Democratic primary with a new spot attacking his challenger, state Rep. Josh Elliott, over missed votes in the state capitol.

The ad charges that Elliott skipped 240 votes in the legislature, “including a vote to hold ICE accountable.” In one case, as the narrator notes, Elliott admitted to falling asleep after missing a vote on an amendment regarding qualified immunity. He apologized afterwards in a post on social media.

Last month, Elliott began airing attack ads after securing $3.75 million in public matching funds, including one spot accusing the wealthy Lamont of “protecting a broken system that enriches him and his friend.”

Lamont has self-funded most of his campaign for a third term but has recently ramped up his personal contributions. As of the middle of the year, he had put in $3.5 million of his own money, but in early July, he added another $6 million on top of that.

According to his most recent disclosures, Lamont has also raised a little over $380,000 from donors while Elliott has brought in $370,000.

House

TN-05

The House Freedom Caucus recently stepped up its spending on behalf of Tennessee Rep. Andy Ogles ahead of Thursday’s GOP primary, but it’s still getting badly outgunned by a PAC supporting the incumbent’s challenger, former state Agriculture Commissioner Charlie Hatcher.

The Freedom Caucus’ PAC has now spent a little over $700,000 on the race while its pro-Hatcher rivals at the Invest In Tomorrow Coalition, a group funded by wealthy renewable energy investors, have poured in $2 million.

One new Freedom Caucus spot goes directly at Hatcher’s allies, asking, “Why are Democrats like Biden’s green energy czar, Jigar Shah, bankrolling Charlie Hatcher? To get even with President Trump and Andy Ogles in the House Freedom Caucus for ending Biden’s Green New Scam.” Shah, who worked at the Department of Energy under Joe Biden, has donated $50,000 to Invest In Tomorrow.

“Shah and the Democrat left hate Ogles and Trump for stopping their open-borders, Islamo-Marxist green agenda—and they’re all in for Charlie Hatcher,” the ad continues before reminding viewers that Donald Trump has endorsed Ogles.

Invest in Tomorrow has run positive ads boosting Hatcher while also attacking Ogles for his history of resume inflation and, in a new spot, for missing votes in Congress.

Whoever wins the Republican nomination will likely go up against Columbia Mayor Chaz Molder in November, though Democrats would much prefer to face the scandal-tarred Ogles.

House Majority Forward

House Majority Forward, the nonprofit affiliate of the House Majority PAC, announced on Monday that it’s spending $15 million to target 19 House districts, the vast majority held by Republicans.

Roughly half the total is devoted to television ads, while the rest will pay for radio and digital ads as well as mailers. In a press release, HMF provided a breakdown of its TV spending by district, which includes just three Democratic seats: North Carolina’s 1st, Ohio’s 9th, and Washington’s 3rd.

The rest all belong to the GOP and feature some reaches that Democrats hadn’t eyed in recent years, including Michigan’s 4th, North Carolina’s 11th, and Ohio’s 10th. Also on the list is Pennsylvania’s 1st, a blue-tilting district in the Philadelphia suburbs that Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick has stubbornly defended for many years.

Obituaries

Kay Granger

Former Texas Rep. Kay Granger, a Republican who represented the Fort Worth area for nearly three decades before leaving office last year, died on Sunday at 83.

Granger got her start in Fort Worth politics in the 1980s, first winning a seat on the City Council in 1989, then becoming mayor two years later. The posts were officially nonpartisan, and Granger carefully cultivated a reputation as a centrist during her time in office.

That led both parties to see her as a prize recruit when the 12th Congressional District came open in 1996. Though at the time a supporter of abortion rights, Granger opted to run under the GOP banner and prevailed handily in both the primary and general elections.

She only faced one serious primary challenge during her long career when she defeated wealthy businessman Chris Putnam 58-42 in 2020 and became chair of the powerful Appropriations Committee after Republicans retook the House two years later.

Granger’s career, however, ended on a troubling note. A year after announcing her retirement late in 2023, a conservative site run by Putnam called the Dallas Express reported that Granger, who had last cast a vote in July, was living at an assisted living facility. Soon after, Granger’s son confirmed the report to the Dallas Morning News, saying the congresswoman was suffering from “dementia issues.”

Poll Pile

• CT-Gov (D): GreatBlue Research for Sacred Heart University, WFSB, and CT Insider:

  • Ned Lamont (inc): 57, Josh Elliott: 22.

• CT-Gov: GreatBlue:

  • Lamont (D-inc): 50, Ryan Fazio (R): 30.

  • Elliott (D): 44, Fazio (R): 30.