#MeToo Movement Lawmaker Investigated for Sexual Misconduct

California Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia is accused of sexually harassing and groping a former staffer.

christina garcia
Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia, D- Bell Gardens, speaks at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif. Women lawmakers, lobbyists and staffers in California's Capitol are encouraging each other to share stories of sexual harassment in the workplace in an effort to show its pervasiveness and to ensure more men stand up against it. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)
AP

California Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia is the subject of a state legislative investigation in the wake of a report that she sexually harassed and groped a former legislative staffer. Garcia made headlines back in December when she was one of the “Silence Breakers” — people who spoke out against sexual harassment — that Time magazine named as its Persons of the Year. But Daniel Fierro of Cerritos told Politico that in 2014, when he was a 25-year-old staff to Assemblyman Ian Calderon, he was groped by Garcia. Garcia is a powerful Democratic lawmaker who chairs the Legislative Women’s Caucus and the Natural Resources Committee. According to Fierro, Garcia allegedly cornered him alone after the annual Assembly softball game in Sacramento as he was cleaning up the dugout. Fierro said that Garcia seemed inebriated. According to his account, Garcia started stroking his back and then squeezed his buttocks and attempted to touch his crotch before he removed himself from the situation. Fierro said he never reported the incident but after the #MeToo movement hit, he mentioned it to his former boss and an investigation was launched. A prominent Sacramento lobbyist says that Garcia also accosted him in May 2017 at a political fundraiser. The lobbyist says that Garcia was again inebriated and that she told him “I’ve set a goal for myself to fuck you,” and she allegedly reached for his crotch.

Garcia was one of hundreds of Sacramento women who signed a letter with the hashtag #WeSaidEnough protesting harassment and told The New York Times she had been the repeated victim of sexual harassment by men in the Capitol in the course of her legislative work.

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