AMNA NAWAZ: In November 2017, during the height of the MeToo movement, a conservative talk-radio
host named Leeann Tweeden accused Minnesota Senator Al Franken of forcing an unwanted
kiss on her a decade earlier.
In the days that followed, seven additional women came forward with allegations of inappropriate
behavior.
Three dozen Democratic senators demanded Franken's resignation from the Senate.
And, by January, he was gone.
A new piece by "The New Yorker"'s Jane Mayer asks the question: Did the punishment fit
the crime?
To dig deeper, I'm joined by longtime Congress watcher Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise
Institute.
He is also a close friend of Senator Franken's.
Norm, welcome back to the "NewsHour."
NORMAN ORNSTEIN, Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute: Great to be back.
AMNA NAWAZ: So, in that "New Yorker" piece, Senator Franken gives an interview.
And he says, when he first heard about the allegation and saw an accompanying photo that
Ms. Tweeden had shared, it was her sleeping on a USO flight.
Senator Franken is reaching out to her and what can only be described as sort of a lewd
gesture...
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: Yes.
AMNA NAWAZ: ... pretending to grope her.
When that photo came out and the piece came out, he said: Oh, my God, my life -- my life.
He knew it would have a big impact.
When you first heard about it, did you feel the same way?
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: I knew it would have an impact, but none of us, his close friends, including
those who'd work with him on "Saturday Night Live" going back decades, the people who worked
on his staff, who had been in his campaign, thought it would have the kind of rolling
and dramatic implications that it did, because there was nothing in his past behavior from
people close to him, including women who had been his press secretary, his chief of staff,
his campaign manager, the women he'd worked with at "SNL," had any sense at all that there
was a problem or a potential problem there.
AMNA NAWAZ: Even as additional women came forward?
Did you start to wonder, maybe I don't know what's really going on here?
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: Well, there was some puzzlement about it.
And most of the additional allegations that emerged were basically from photo-ops that
he'd taken at the Minnesota State Fair with tens of thousands of people around or in very
public settings of grabbing a buttock or a waist even during a photo-op.
And the questions of whether this was a misinterpretation, crossed signals, a kind of "Rashomon" kind
of thing all emerged.
But, obviously, as each additional one emerged, you wondered what the political dynamic would
be in the Senate.
But through all of this, people who knew him well and those who knew his family well, there
was never any sense that Al was in the same category as people with whom he was being
lumped together, like Harvey Weinstein or Charlie Rose.
AMNA NAWAZ: Well, the calls for him to resign from his senator colleagues, they came pretty
quickly.
And I wonder, did you talk to him at the time?
Did you offer him any counsel as to what he should do?
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: Yes.
And from the beginning, when the Tweeden accusations emerged -- and it's, as the Jane Mayer article
points out, a much more complex setting, where a lot of what she said was simply not true
-- what Al did was, first, he didn't want to blame the victim, which makes you look
like a jerk.
And, obviously, there's a long history of that.
But he also called for this Senate ethics investigation, believing that people other
than himself who could look at this and look at the nature of these allegations, what the
real truth was, would have it emerge eventually.
And that it suddenly turned with a kind of perfect storm to these calls for his resignation,
starting with Senator Gillibrand and including a bunch of others, was stunning to him and
to all of us.
AMNA NAWAZ: So you mentioned Senator Gillibrand.
She was, in fact, the first senator to call for his resignation.
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: Yes.
AMNA NAWAZ: Take a listen to what she had to say back at that time.
SEN.
KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND (D-NY), Presidential Candidate: I do not feel that he should continue to serve.
Everyone will make their own judgment.
I hope they do make their own judgment.
AMNA NAWAZ: She was asked about why she made that decision in a recent interview.
This was Judy Woodruff back in May of this year.
Take a listen to what she had to say then.
SEN.
KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND: I have a responsibility.
I stood with eight women who feel they were groped and forcibly kissed by Senator Franken
inappropriately, and spoke out.
I stood with them.
And, again, if our party is going to punish women who stand up for other women, then we
are absolutely going in the wrong direction.
AMNA NAWAZ: Norm, from the Democratic standpoint, do you understand why Senator Gillibrand and
why so many others called for Senator Franken to resign?
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: The way in which it happened, and the move to force him out, without allowing
any due process, and basically saying, doesn't matter what the nature of the offenses is,
you're out of here, with all the public humiliation that came with it, was still pretty stunning.
And one of the key points in this article is, seven senators, including women and men,
who said you should resign now saying, oh, my God, we made terrible mistakes, we should
have let due process go forward.
And I have been around the Senate for 50 years.
I have never found a situation where seven senators admit to a major mistake.
It's hard to find one.
AMNA NAWAZ: Have you spoken to any others who also regret calling for his resignation?
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: There are other senators who don't want to come forward now because
you get in the crosshairs on an issue like this.
And that's a part of what happened.
But, yes, there are plenty who got caught up in the moment.
And, remember, one of the things that happens in cases like this is, media go on a death
watch.
And so there were 50 cameras and other reporters surrounding his daughter's house when he was
there.
Every Democratic senator had microphones thrust in their faces: What are you going to do?
What are you going to do?
And people caved, and now, I think, believe that they made a mistake.
It was a perfect storm in a lot of ways.
And I have to say some of it came from Senator Schumer, the leader, who basically told Franken,
if you don't announce you're resigning by 5:00 p.m., the same day that all of this emerged,
then I will get the caucus to vote calling for your resignation, and we may strip you
of your committees, and you will become a pariah.
So the pressure was intense.
And there wasn't any sense of, let's step back from this.
AMNA NAWAZ: What do you think would be different today if Senator Franken had not resigned?
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: I think Al, who was an enormous force in the Senate, would be an enormous
force in the Senate.
He would have been a force in a lot of the hearings that have taken place.
He would have been strong when it came to the Mueller report and Trump's reaction to
it.
He would have been an incredible questioner.
He's missed in the Senate, as a lot of people see it.
But it's also a human tragedy that something like this that might have resulted with an
ethics investigation and, what Jane Mayer's article shows, probably a letter of admonishment,
that it ended up destroying a career and causing an enormous level of heartache is really unfortunate.
AMNA NAWAZ: Is his political career over?
Why give this interview now?
Do you think he would ever run for office again?
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: I think more significant is getting his voice back.
When he announced that he would resign, under this intense pressure, he said: I'm not going
to give up my voice in public issues.
He started a podcast.
He's doing a little writing.
There are a lot of issues he cares about.
I think the importance of this article and the interview is, now we can have Al Franken
back as a public voice.
And his is an important and powerful voice.
And with all the tragedy, at least that's a very positive thing.
AMNA NAWAZ: Norman Ornstein, thanks very much for being here.
NORMAN ORNSTEIN: My pleasure.