Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) batted down accusations that he was part of a “smear campaign” against a congressional staffer and fellow military veteran last week.
Crenshaw denied accusations that have gained traction in press outlets such as MSNBC, Newsweek, and ProPublica. The Texas congressman called the accusations, which stem from a Dec. 10 inspector general report, “garbage” and said that journalists repeating the claims “should stop playing into partisan politics.”
“I have never participated in a ‘smear campaign’ against anyone, much less a fellow veteran,” Crenshaw said on Twitter Wednesday. “For a smear campaign to be a smear campaign, there has to be a smear in the first place, and *no one has identified what that is.* Why? Because the smear does not exist. There is no truth to it. It is a lie.”
Crenshaw has been accused of participating in a smear campaign against a fellow veteran of the Navy, Andrea Goldstein, who said she was sexually assaulted while visiting a Veterans Affairs hospital. None of the alleged smears Crenshaw has been accused of making have ever been made public or reported in the press, however.
“I will not stand by and have my good name and reputation tarnished by this partisan hack job. I would never assume, without evidence, that a fellow-veteran’s claims are untrue, nor would I attempt to involve myself in any ongoing investigation,” Crenshaw added.
Left-wing journalists and progressive activists have accused Crenshaw of “smearing” Goldstein. MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes ran a Dec. 17 segment slamming the Texas congressman.
“Of course, this kind of thing may not actually hurt Crenshaw as he seeks to climb the ladder of Republican politics, but when you come across him from now on you should add ‘implicated in smearing a sexual harassment whistleblower’ to the list of things that come to mind,” Hayes said.
Left-wing veterans’ groups Common Defense and Vote Vets have jumped on the “smearing” accusation, calling for Crenshaw to resign over incident.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has defended the freshman congressman, condemning the “attacks” and calling Crenshaw a “hero.”
“Dan Crenshaw is a hero to this nation. I know a lot of people try to do a lot of things with Dan because he’s willing to stand up,” McCarthy told Newsweek on Friday. “I see the attacks, and they should stop.”
On Sept. 20, 2019, congressional staffer Goldstein reported that a man had sexually assaulted her in a café of the Washington, D.C., VA Medical Center. The inspector general for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) investigated the complaint and closed the case four months later without filing charges. In February, House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs chairman Rep. Mark Takano (D-CA) wrote to the IG requesting a follow-up investigation into reports that “VA officials used government time and resources to undermine the credibility of” Goldstein after she filed her complaint.
The IG launched an investigation into the VA’s response to Goldstein’s complaint. In a report issued on Dec. 10, investigators found that while VA Secretary Robert Wilkie acted “unprofessional and disparaging, the OIG identified no violation of law, regulation, or policy in connection with the statements reported to have been made by Secretary Wilkie to other VA officials concerning the veteran, and therefore makes no formal recommendations.”
In the report, Several of Wilkie’s top staffers said Crenshaw told Wilkie damaging details of Goldstein’s time on active duty in the Navy. To the IG, Wilkie denied ever speaking to Crenshaw of Goldstein other than to find out whether Crenshaw, a former Navy SEAL, had served in the same unit as Goldstein in the Navy. Crenshaw and Wilkie only spoke once, according to the report, at a chance meeting at a fundraiser on Dec. 4, 2019.
After the fundraiser, Wilkie sent an email to then-assistant secretary for Congressional and Legislative Affairs Brooks Tucker telling him to “Ask me in the morning what Congressman Crenshaw said about the Takano staffer (Goldstein) whose glamour shot was in the New York Times.” The IG asked Wilkie about the email and what Crenshaw told him about Goldstein. According to the report:
When presented with the email excerpted in figure 3, Secretary Wilkie maintained that the only information he recalled being imparted by Congressman Crenshaw was that the congressman had served with the veteran in the Navy. OIG investigators asked why information about them serving together, on its own, would be sufficiently remarkable to merit an email about passing that mention along to Mr. Tucker and Ms. Powers. Secretary Wilkie stated, “Well I don’t remember. I have no idea.” Secretary Wilkie told OIG investigators that the “glamor shot” remark referred to a photo of the veteran that accompanied the news story about her allegations in September 2019, and he expressed regret that he had made the remark.