The Democrat-led Senate Foreign Relations Committee advanced the nomination of embattled former Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti to be U.S. Ambassador to India — with the support of two Senate Republicans — amid allegations his office covered up sexual assault and harassment.
Garcetti, who welcomed the nomination from President Joe Biden in 2021, has been accused of turning a blind eye when a Los Angeles police officer was allegedly sexually harassed by a former top aide to the mayor. The former Los Angeles mayor denied the allegations, saying he did not witness any inappropriate behavior.
The issue has left an unprecedented two-year vacancy in New Delhi, which has left Republicans and some Democrats uncertain about supporting Garcetti because of his alleged past actions.
Despite the accusations against Garcetti, committee members voted 13-8, with Republican Sens. Todd Young of Indiana and Bill Hagerty of Tennessee supporting. The Democrat party, including two female Sens. Mazie Hirono of Hawaii and Tammy Duckworth of Illinois, reportedly told Politico they plan on supporting Garcetti’s nomination.
Minority ranking member Sen. James Risch (R-ID) told Punchbowl News on Capitol Hill that he would vote against Garcetti’s nomination citing “new evidence [that] has raised enough questions regarding his judgment.”
“We must ensure that any chief of mission will, without question, protect our foreign service officers and embassy staff from all types of harassment,” Risch said.
Risch reportedly previously backed Garcetti in committee.
Garcetti cleared the hurdle after nearly 600 days since his nod from the Biden administration and shortly after committee member Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) placed a hold on the nomination, complicating his path to a floor vote by the full Senate.
Rubio included Garcetti’s nod in a list of “questionable individuals” nominated by the Biden administration, saying in a press release, “one of these nominees has ignored credible sexual assault accusations in his prior office.”
Congress advanced the former mayor’s nomination last year in the previous Congress just before he faced the sexual assault accusations, which surfaced when the Los Angeles area struggled during COVID as it faced intense lockdowns that contributed to residents moving out of the city.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) requested an investigation into Garcetti last year that delayed the mayor’s ambassador nomination Senate confirmation vote.
The report found, according to CBS, that it was “more probable than not” that Garcetti was aware that his former aide Rick Jacobs “sexually harassed multiple individuals and made racist comments towards others.”
“Mr. Jacobs’ behavior was widely known and talked about,” the report reads. “It was pervasive, widespread and notorious — to the point that Mr. Jacobs sexually harassed someone in front of the mayor for a picture that would be memorialized for all of time. Such overt conduct suggests at best that Mr. Jacobs had no fear of any repercussions.”
Naomi Seligman, Garcetti’s former communications director and whistleblower who testified to sexual abuse at L.A. City Hall and was herself a victim, told The Daily Wire in an email statement that Garcetti’s advancement is “disheartening, to say the least.”
“Today’s vote, on International Women’s Day no less, shows a real disconnect between the rhetoric we hear from elected leaders who claim to support victims of workplace sexual harassment and the pass they give to party loyalists in the next breath,” Seligman said.
“It was already clear from the time of his nomination that Garcetti was unfit to represent our country, and each passing month reveals new embarrassments to the President and the Senate – from prior perjury before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, strong arming senators to support his nomination, more witnesses and victims of sexual harassment, and multiple members of the Garcetti administration facing corruption charges and serving prison sentences,” she added.
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Garcetti’s next step is to gain a vote on the U.S. Senate floor.
Whistleblower Aid, the non-profit legal organization supporting individuals who lawfully report government and corporate law-breaking, previously called the committee’s support for Garcetti “a bitter pill to swallow” amid the sexual assault accusations placed against him.
In an email to The Daily Wire, the organization urged the full Senate to “reject Garcetti and confirm a nominee with a clear record on protecting victims of sexual harassment and abuse.”