Why was Al Franken forced to resign, while GOPer...

[edhopper]

...the problem here is you can immediately think of half a dozen Repug MFers that it applies to.

[SpankMe]

1. Because Al has integrity and a conscience

...something that's lacking in 90% of GOP'ers.

Dems & progressives: Get caught red-handed, apologize and gracefully bow out.

Repubs and conservatives: Get caught red-handed, deny, distort and fight until you wear out everyone around you.

[maxsolomon]

4. Except Franken wasn't "caught red-handed"; he was ratfucked by Leanne Tweeden et al,

and his Senate colleagues threw him under the bus, so he resigned rather than have the internecine fight the GQP wanted.

Read, or don't: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/29/the-case-of-al-franken

[edhopper]

5. 1000%

THIS^^^^^

[tirebiter]

8. Roger Stone used her. Like they used her to take down Dr Jocelyn Elders.

Not like she wasn’t a willing participant but Stone led the mission

[catrose]

18. Yes!

[PoliticAverse]

25. Actually he lost all support in his party and that's why he quit. He now says resigning was an error

[RB TexLa]

2. Because Republicans defend their members no matter what

Democrats will only consider defending an accused Democratic official if their position is vulnerable.

Had Al been elected from North Carolina it might have been a different story.

[SoonerPride]

3. Because Democrats rushed to hound him out of office

We eat our own all the time.

[LakeArenal]

20. Indeed. I'm still mad at all of them.

Even those with lofty positions.

[Busterscruggs]

6. I wish

He hadn't decided to take that flack jacket picture. I had a hard time explaining that he wasn't a misogynist and was really a good man when that whole thing erupted. My friend kept saying "but did you see that picture?!"

[wellst0nev0ter]

22. The picture lampooned a skit Franken and Tweeden were doing

during the USO tour. There were other pictures of Franken doing the same pose on Tweeden, with the second clearly laughing at the joke.

Tell your friend they have been tricked by lying, two-faced trumpanzees.

[tritsofme]

7. He chose to resign. No one "forced" him.

[edhopper]

9. Schumer told him

it was time, he lost the support of the Dem leadership.
Yes, he was forced.

[tritsofme]

12. Schumer wasn't wrong, but he had no way to force his resignation.

Franken could have chosen to try and ride out the storm, instead he chose to resign.

[edhopper]

14. We disagree

technically, no one can be forced to resign. This was how it works politically.

[Locutusofborg]

10. Republicans who resigned

Mark Souder, Representative (Republican-Indiana) — A staunch advocate of abstinence and family values, Souder resigned to avoid an ethics investigation into his admitted extramarital affair with a female staffer.--2010

Chris Lee, Representative (Republican-New York) — Resigned hours after a news report stated that he had sent a shirtless picture of himself flexing his muscles to a woman via Craigslist, along with flirtatious e-mails. He did not rely on a pseudonym or a false e-mail address, but used his official Congressional e-mail for all communication. Lee said: “I regret the harm that my actions have caused my family, my staff, and my constituents.... I have made profound mistakes, and I promise to work as hard as I can to seek their forgiveness.”--2011

Blake Farenthold, Representative (Republican-Texas) — was reported to have paid $84,000 of taxpayer money, via the House of Representatives Office of Compliance, to settle a sexual harassment complaint from a former staffer. Farenthold's former communications director, Lauren Greene, sued the congressman in December 2014, and a settlement was reached in 2015. The identity of Farenthold with respect to taxpayer involvement was made public in 2017. This was the first documented case of taxpayer funds being used to settle sexual harassment complaints against a member of Congress. Upon resigning, Farenthold pledged to reimburse the US$84,000 in public money that he used to settle the lawsuit and then reneged on his pledge to repay in May 2018--(2014) (2018)

Tim Murphy, Representative (Republican-Pennsylvania) — Had an extramarital affair with Shannon Edwards, a 32-year-old forensic psychologist. The self-identified "pro-life" Murphy asked Edwards to have an abortion after she became pregnant. The information was revealed as part of Murphy's divorce proceedings, and published by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette after it fought in Pennsylvania state court to have the documents unsealed. Murphy resigned his seat in Congress.--2017

Trent Franks, Representative (Republican-Arizona) — was investigated by the House Ethics Commission about allegations of improper conduct. Before the study concluded, Franks abruptly resigned. Franks had repeatedly asked two female staffers to bear his children as surrogate mothers; he allegedly offered one of them $5 million to carry his child and retaliated against her when she declined. The women feared that Franks wanted to impregnate them sexually as part of the surrogacy process. (2017)

Joe Barton, Representative (Republican-Texas) — Acknowledged he took and emailed nude photos of himself in 2015, following leaks of the photos in November 2017. He decided not to seek re-election in 2018

Pat Meehan, Representative (Republican-Pennsylvania) — In January, 2018, it was revealed that Representative Meehan used taxpayer funds to settle a sexual harassment claim levied by a female staffer. He was removed from the House Ethics Committee, but remained in office until he resigned on April 27, 2018, stating that he would repay the taxpayer money used to settle the suit.--(2018)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_federal_political_sex_scandals_in_the_United_States

[brooklynite]

11. Because he lost the support of EVERY Democratic Senator except for.....Joe Manchin.

What Republicans do is irrelevant.

[Poiuyt]

16. Democrats have integrity

Republicans?...not so much

[Hekate]

13. Because we are stupid?

[David__77]

15. He wasn't forced to resign.

….

[wellst0nev0ter]

23. Schumer told Franken himself to resign

But you're right, Franken should have stayed, despite having almost the entire Democratic caucus wrongly against him.

[Act_of_Reparation]

17. Because Democratic voters have standards.

Right or wrong, Franken was seen to have violated those standards. I don't know what else to say about it other than it is probably better to have standards than not.

[wellst0nev0ter]

24. Where were those standards for Bob Menendez?

Yes, Menendez later had the corruption case against him dropped, and it would have been monumentally stupid to force him out of office while New Jersey had a goop governor who could replace him with another goop.

Franken should have at least had some sort of investigation done in his case before we acted.

[Act_of_Reparation]

27. I am not saying Franken should have resigned or that the situation was handled correctly.

I'm merely stating the key condition that precipitated his resignation.

[ShazamIam]

19. Franken was forced out by his own party members who didn's even allow him an investigation.

[krawhitham]

26. Al Franken was sacrificed for a Doug Jones win, which saved the ACA

Doug Jones' numbers were dropping fast because local media was running nothing but stories about Doug Jones being a hypocrite because Democrats were keeping Al while bashing child rapist Roy Moore (WOW Alabama, do better)