Gordon Sondland will not resign amid multiple accusations of sexual misconduct.
An associate of the hotelier told Politico that Sondland has no plans to resign from his post as ambassador to the European Union after three women accused him of making unwanted sexual advances and then retaliating against them.
A lawyer for Sondland suggested that the allegations constituted “witness tampering” in the context of the impeachment proceedings that are consuming national politics. The ambassador’s testimony in the inquiry into President Donald Trump has been perceived by some Democrats as the most damning to date.
A trio of allegations
According to Politico, three women accused Sondland of trying to punish them when he rejected their advances, years before he worked in the Trump administration. The allegations surfaced in a report Wednesday from ProPublica and Portland Monthly, a magazine that is owned by one of the accusers, Nicole Vogel.
Vogel had approached Sondland, a wealthy and powerful hotelier from the Pacific Northwest, seeking capital for her then-new magazine in 2003. The publisher claims that Sondland was interested in making an investment until she rejected his advances at a hotel he owned, where he asked her for a hug and then, she says, “grabs my face and goes to kiss me.” Later, during a silent car ride, she alleges that Sondland placed his hand on her thigh.
Another woman, Jana Solis, claimed that Sondland slapped her rear during a business lunch in 2008. She later agreed to go back to Sondland’s Portland home to look at his art collection, including a picture of Sondland and George W. Bush, when Sondland exposed himself to her in his pool-house. Solis, a safety engineer, also said that Sondland forcibly kissed her at a later meeting at one of his hotels.
A third woman, Natalie Sept, accused Sondland of forcibly trying to kiss her after a dinner to discuss a job opportunity, which she said Sondland never mentioned again after the encounter. But the allegations, which have not been proven, are apparently not enough to force Sondland out; an associate of the ambassador’s told Politico that Sondland has “no intention of resigning.”
Witness tampering?
Portland Monthly said that it partnered with ProPublica, a journalism nonprofit, on the report because Vogel was a subject of the story. But Sondland’s lawyer, Jim McDermott, said that the allegations appeared to be a politically motivated attempt to “affect Ambassador Sondland’s credibility as a fact witness in the pending impeachment inquiry,” accusing the magazine of “veiled witness tampering.”
“Notably, what each of these three women share in common is that they pursued Ambassador Sondland for financial and personal gain — an investment, a job, and insurance brokerage work — and he declined their proposals,” McDermott added.
In a statement, Sondland said: “These untrue claims of unwanted touching and kissing are concocted and, I believe, coordinated for political purposes. They have no basis in fact, and I categorically deny them.”
Sondland rose to his post after donating $1 million to Trump’s inaugural committee. Democrats hailed Sondland’s “damning” testimony that Trump did seek a “quid pro quo” with Ukraine as the nail in the coffin for Trump’s impeachment defense, but Trump’s defenders have pointed to the fact that Sondland’s conclusion about the quid pro quo was his own “presumption,” according to Politico.
Trump himself claimed vindication from Sondland’s testimony, according to RealClear Politics. Reading aloud a portion of a conversation that Sondland recalled having with the president, Trump said on the White House lawn: “I want nothing. I want nothing. I want no quid pro quo. Tell [Ukraine’s president] to do the right thing.”
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