Last week, Democratic Rep. Katie Hill was finally pressured into resigning her seat. It took more than a week after she had been credibly accused of sexually exploiting as many as two of her subordinates.
Hill admittedly spent campaign donors’ money to put one of her lovers on the payroll and allegedly spent taxpayers’ money to keep another lover on the payroll. (For the record, she denies the latter affair.)
On Thursday, Hill delivered a typically entitled and whiny farewell speech, in which she claimed to be the victim of a double standard. “I’m stepping down,” she said, “But I refuse to let this experience scare off other women who dare to take risks, who dare to step into this light, who dare to be powerful.”
Fortunately, most women have better judgment than Hill. She is no victim. She is a walking, talking, excuse-making, self-pitying example of how bosses — and not just male ones — can abuse power in the workplace.
The idea that Hill is somehow a victim in all of this, or that her case somehow reveals a double standard favoring men’s disgraceful, caddish behavior over that of women, is risible. If she were a man, Hill would certainly face similar consequences, or perhaps even more severe ones.
We don’t have to wonder, of course, because this sort of thing happens with male congressmen all the time. Many men have been forced out of politics permanently for having — or simply attempting — affairs. Examples include former Sens. John Ensign and John Edwards, and Reps. Vance McAllister, Chris Lee, Vito Fossella, and Tim Murphy.
But Hill, whose husband did not object to her having a 24-year-old female lover, might not exactly fall into that category. She actually did worse, taking sexual liberties with paid staff over whom she exercised significant power. With few exceptions, men caught doing this have paid the same price Hill is paying now. Such relationships, even when nominally consensual, are now considered sexual misconduct under House ethics rules adopted in 2018, because members of Congress simply exercise too much power over staff.
Hill’s defenders draw misguided comparisons to Rep. Duncan Hunter, Jr. of California, who pursued illicit relationships with two House staffers years before such relationships were formally banned. Hunter is facing a 60-count federal indictment and has been forced to step down from all committees. Is this really a comparison that Hill’s defenders want to make?
They also point to Rep. Alcee Hastings of Florida, but his case is somewhat different. He put his longtime girlfriend on his office payroll so that he could pay her the maximum $168,000 salary. Only the voters of Hastings’ district can really be blamed for electing someone so proudly and transparently corrupt — a former federal judge impeached for taking bribes and then elected to Congress. Hastings is one of a kind.
The more accurate comparison for Hill’s behavior is to former Rep. Mark Souder of Indiana, who resigned in disgrace after his affair with a staffer was made public.
The idea that women are being held to a higher standard in this matter is ridiculous, especially if Hill’s case is supposed to serve as the case study. Nowadays, even a male member of Congress as powerful as the late 26-term Rep. John Conyers of Michigan can be ousted for making unwanted advances toward female staff, to say nothing of peons like former Reps. Ruben Kihuen of Nevada and Blake Farenthold of Texas. Even a fundraising juggernaut like former Sen. Al Franken of Minnesota can now be thrown overboard when his groping, harassing ways were exposed. Men’s caddish ways are not protected.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York argued that Hill’s case is unique in yet another way: “This doesn’t happen to male members in the same way — revenge porn in this respect. It’s horrific,” Ocasio-Cortez told Politico.
But as usual, Ocasio-Cortez is wrong. This has indeed happened to a man — former Rep. Joe Barton of Texas — and quite recently.
In the end, Hill has no one to blame but herself. Her attempt to turn her own misconduct and abuse into some kind of feminist issue is just one more obvious indication that her district’s voters made a horrific mistake in electing her.
