State Treasurer Michael Fitzgerald is asking Iowa’s governor to ensure Iowa taxpayers don’t foot the bill for the judgment the former communications director for Republicans in the Iowa Senate won from a jury last week.
A jury awarded the money to Kirsten Anderson who filed a lawsuit charging her complaints about sexual harassment were disregarded and she was fired from her job on the Senate Republican Caucus Staff for complaining. Anderson’s bosses say she was fired for poor work and nothing else. Fitzgerald says testimony in the trial brought appalling behavior to light and he says Governor Kim Reynolds immediately should have insisted on changes in the legislature.
Reynolds told reporters last week she has a “zero tolerance policy” when it comes to sexual harassment in the state agencies she oversees, but Reynolds says she has no control over personnel policies in the legislature, which is a separate branch of state government. Senate Republicans will meet privately this Friday. One Republican senator has publicly called for Senate Republican Leader Bill Dix to step down from his leadership post. The second-ranking Republican in the state senate has issued a statement supporting Dix.
