Taking a break from sexual harassment scandals, state House Democrats are now embroiled in a bizarre scandal in which a male Democrat is accusing another male in Democratic leadership of harassment and bullying.
The clash of thin skins occurred in a committee hearing last week on homeless issues over completely questions.
The victim is state Rep. Donald Valdez, who may seek to expel the accused bully and harasser, Rep. Jovan Melton, House majority deputy whip.
As best we can determine from the Denver Post story, Valdez said he was concerned about unspecified changes in the bill he hadn’t had time to review.
An irked Melton replied, “I’m not sure exactly what your concern is.”
Outrageous, right? But wait, there’s even more nonsense that sparked this epic anger fit — Valdez had the gall to ask an off-topic question about hunting to another member and this led to a hallway fight.
Wasn’t going to report this, but now that Rep. @DonaldValdezCO is at House well talking about harassment, context is needed. He had an incident with Reps in his own party that resulted in sergeants pulling him and that lawmaker apart just outside speaker’s door. #coleg
— Charles Ashby (@OldNewsman) March 16, 2018
Valdez has since reported the incident to Human Resources and met with House Majority Leader KC Becker, who with House Speaker Crisanta Duran said they were working to mediate the “situation.”
It sounds like both Valdez and Melton need to be sent to time-out corners. Melton, for some anger management therapy.
Valdez just needs to watch a few episodes of “Questions with the Prime Minister” on C-SPAN for a hefty dose of political reality.
Being harassed, provoked, bullied, picked on and called out are all just some of the perks of being a public official.*
*Update: We’ve since been informed this is not the first time Melton and Rep. Joe Salazar, of Thornton have ganged up on Valdez, who is a conservative Democrat and doesn’t cave to their demands on how he votes on certain measures.
It’s one thing for lawmakers to be challenged on their opinions, but it’s quite another matter if Democratic lawmakers are being threatened or bullied into changing their votes on legislation.
Now it makes sense why this is such a big deal.
Valdez is a poor example of a State House Representative. HR#62 is his district and also includes where I am in Costilla. It’s such a shame that there’s NO ONE who is Republican that is running against him for the Primary. He’s done absolutely nothing.