POLITICS
Incumbent Won’t Dismiss Smear of Gay Challenger
Massachusetts Democrat adopts Trumpian agnosticism toward fabricated charges
BY DUNCAN OSBORNE
While allegations of
sexual misconduct
with University of
Massachusetts students
against Alex Morse, an out
gay candidate running to be the
Democratic nominee in a Massachusetts
congressional district,
have been shown to be fabricated,
the House member who has held
that seat since 1988 suggested in a
debate that they might be true.
“A series of students have
stepped forward,” said Democrat
Richard Neal, who has represented
the First Congressional District in
Massachusetts for more 30 years,
during an August 17 debate that
was livestreamed by New England
Public Radio. “They’ve raised
these allegations. They’ve also said
simultaneously, they had no contact
with my campaign. This is inconsistent
with my career and it’s
inconsistent with my character to
have raised these sorts of issues.
These students have stepped forward,
they should be heard.”
On August 7, The Daily Collegian,
a student newspaper that is
distributed on the UMass campuses,
reported that members of the
College Democrats of Massachusetts
(CDMA) and the Amherst College
chapter of that group had sent
Morse a letter telling him he was
no longer welcome at their events.
The letter said that Morse, 31, had
contacted students via social media
after meeting them at CDMA
events and the students had felt
“uncomfortable” with those contacts.
The letter also said Morse,
who was teaching at UMass from
2014 to 2019, had “sexual contact
with college students, including at
UMass Amherst, where he teaches,
and the greater Five College Consortium.”
UMass policy allows faculty to
have sex with students who they
are not teaching, grading, or supervising.
Sex between consenting
adults of the same sex is legal
in Massachusetts and across the
country.
Morse, who was fi rst elected
Massachusetts Congressmember Richard Neal, as chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, has
oversight of hundreds of billions in federal spending annually, but in a debate on August 17 was unable
to acknowledge that provably false allegations against his primary opponent were in fact false.
mayor of Holyoke at 22, issued a
statement to The Daily Collegian in
which he said, “I have had consensual
adult relationships, including
some with college students…
Navigating life as both a young gay
man and an elected offi cial can be
diffi cult, but that doesn’t excuse
poor judgment.”
With just three weeks until the
September 1 Democratic Primary,
that could have ended his campaign,
but The Intercept, an online
news outlet, published a series of
stories beginning on August 12
showing that the charges in the
letter were fabricated by students
in CDMA, including Timothy Ennis
and Andrew Abramson. The effort
to smear Morse and help Neal
started in October 2019. Ennis was
a student in a class taught by Neal
and he hoped that Neal would hire
him to help launch his own political
career.
Grace Panetta, a reporter at
Business Insider, also an online
news outlet, put up a long post
on Twitter in which she described
receiving an anonymous email in
April offering a story about Morse
engaging inappropriately with students.
It supplied the names of
three people who could corroborate
the allegations – Ennis, Abramson,
and a third person whom Panetta
did not name.
REUTERS/ YURI GRIPAS
In later stories, The Intercept reported
that senior members of the
Massachusetts Democratic Party,
including Veronica Martinez, the
state party’s executive director,
Gus Bickford, the party chairman,
and attorney Jim Roosevelt, the
grandson of President Franklin D.
Roosevelt whom The Intercept described
as a “powerful state party
fi gure,” had assisted the students
in crafting the letter. The latest story,
which was published on August
17, reported that Martinez had instructed
the students to destroy all
records related to the smear campaign.
That instruction came after
press coverage had turned decidedly
in support of Morse and the
state party had started an investigation
into the smear campaign.
Since no students who had sex
with Morse or may have felt uncomfortable
with a politician using
social media to contact politically
engaged young people who might
someday volunteer on a campaign
have stepped forward to complain
about Morse, it was unclear who
Neal believes “should be heard.”
Even as the allegations against
Morse were proven to be fabricated,
the reaction among some reporters
in the mainstream press has been
to confl ate Morse saying he has
had sex with consenting adults for
the false accusations and assume
Morse had done something wrong.
Ray Hershel, the moderator of
the acrimonious, hour-long debate,
was no exception. The fi rst question
Hershel asked, and the fi rst
question in the debate, was about
a “power difference” in Morse’s sexual
encounters and if Morse could
prove that Neal was involved in the
smear campaign.
“This was a backroom coordinated
political smear against our
campaign by folks that support
this congressman’s campaign,”
Morse said. “Evidence has come
to light over the past week and it
is a culture of folks trying to curry
favor with one of the most powerful
Democrats in Washington… It’s
no coincidence, the timing of these
allegations and accusations that
go all the way to the height of the
Massachusetts Democratic Party.”
When Hershel again asked about
a “power difference,” Morse said. “I
am an adult and I will not apologize
for being a young person, for
being gay, and for being single and
having sexual consensual relationships
with other adults.”
While Neal, who chairs the powerful
House Ways and Means Committee,
did not condemn the attacks
on Morse, he did say, “There
can be no room in America, in this
campaign, or anybody else on the
basis of homophobia, racism, or
misogyny. These students stepped
forward independently of me…
Clearly, unequivocally, no room
for homophobia and my campaign
was not part of this action under
any circumstances… I don’t even
know the names of the students
that have stepped forward.”
Neal made no reference to whether
he has had any contact with the
state party about this scandal.
Neal said of the investigation,
“There is a process in place, an
investigator has been hired, and a
review will shortly be underway. I
am more than content to let that
review takes its course.”
The debate was organized by a
consortium of media organizations,
including New England Public Media,
The Republican and MassLive,
and The Berkshire Eagle.
August 27 - September 9,18 2020 | GayCityNews.com
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