11/29/17: Audio: CBC Chair Cedric Richmond Talks #Conyers and Due Process

After the weekly Congressional Black Caucus meeting, Chairman Richmond spoke with reporters.

Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Cedric Richmond (D-LA) did not mince words about the Conyers situation when he stood before cameras outside the weekly CBC meeting in the U.S. Capitol on November 29, 2017. The questions from reporters were all about one thing: what happens to Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), the 88-year-old Dean of the House, who had stepped down as ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee four days earlier after BuzzFeed published allegations of sexual harassment.

Richmond, who had taken the CBC gavel in January 2017, stuck to a careful line. He praised the accusers for coming forward, but told reporters the process playing out at the House Ethics Committee needed to be allowed to run. “Due process is important,” Richmond said. “We’re not going to rush to judgment on a man who has served 52 years in Congress, written the bill to make Dr. King’s birthday a federal holiday, and who chairs the reparations bill.”

The framing put Richmond on a collision course with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), who two days earlier had called Conyers “an icon” on Meet the Press before reversing course as the accusations expanded. By the time Richmond spoke, at least three women had come forward and Conyers had already paid a $27,000 settlement in 2015 out of his congressional office budget, a fact first reported by BuzzFeed’s Paul McLeod.

Richmond also addressed the quiet race inside the Democratic caucus. Conyers, Rep. Al Franken (D-MN) and Rep. Ruben Kihuen (D-NV) were all under scrutiny in the same week, but the pressure on Conyers was moving faster. Several CBC members privately told reporters they resented the speed. “We want the same standard applied across the board,” Richmond said in the audio, without naming Franken.

Asked whether he was urging Conyers to resign, Richmond declined. He instead pointed at the process at the House Committee on Ethics, which had announced an investigation on November 21. He also said the CBC had not taken a formal position calling for the Dean’s departure. “That’s a decision for Congressman Conyers and his family,” Richmond said.

Six days later, on December 5, 2017, Conyers announced his retirement on Mildred Gaddis’ radio show in Detroit. His attorney Arnold Reed was at his hospital bedside. The audio above, recorded outside the House Democratic caucus room, is one of the last public snapshots of the CBC chair trying to hold that line.