The Los Angeles radio anchor who has accused Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) of groping her while she was asleep will be a guest on Larry O’Connor’s Washington, D.C.-based WMAL radio show Thursday afternoon.
Leeann Tweeden wrote in a piece on KABC’s website that the incident occurred in December 2006, before Franken won his Senate seat, while the two were on a USO tour.
Tweeden included a photo of Franken, who has been married since 1975, grabbing her breasts while smiling back at the camera.
“It wasn’t until I was back in the U.S. and looking through the CD of photos we were given by the photographer that I saw this one,” Tweeden wrote.
“I felt violated all over again. Embarrassed. Belittled. Humiliated,” she wrote. “How dare anyone grab my breasts like this and think it’s funny?”
Tweeden said Franken also forcibly kissed her while rehearing for a skit.
Franken later apologized in a statement.
“I certainly don’t remember the rehearsal for the skit in the same way, but I send my sincerest apologies to Leeann,” Franken said.
“As to the photo, it was clearly intended to be funny but wasn’t. I shouldn’t have done it.”
“WMAL is heard in the corridors of power from one side of Pennsylvania Avenue to the other. I want Leeann to tell her story, in her voice, and let it reverberate on Capitol Hill,” O’Connor told The Hill on Thursday morning.
“This photograph shows Sen. Franken, just two years from his election, mind you, groping a woman while sleeping,” the host continued. “I’d like to say it represents conduct unbecoming a U.S. senator, but with all we’ve learned about the men who came before Sen. Franken, I’m afraid the opposite is true.”
Female lawmakers have come forward in recent days with accounts of predatory behavior by male members of Congress.
Republican Roy Moore has also refused to step aside in the Alabama Senate race despite allegations he pursued teens decades ago when he was in his 30s.