Democratic Rep. Jevin Hodge resigned on Tuesday, capping a political career that must be one for the record books.
Hodge, 30, who once upon a time (read: last week) was considered an up-and-coming Democratic star, trudges out of the Arizona Legislature just 48 days after he was appointed to fill a vacancy.
There’s a lesson in there for aspiring politicians who think they can outrun the skeletons in their closet. And for the people who supposedly (theoretically?) vet them.
Thanks to the internet, those skeletons are now wearing Nikes.
Hodge’s political death occurred on Monday morning when The Arizona Republic’s Mary Jo Pitzl revealed he was kicked off campus at George Washington University in 2016 for violating the school’s sexual violence and sexual misconduct policies.
A student from Boston College reported that he sexually assaulted her in his Washington, D.C., apartment in October 2015, saying “he would like to have sex with her while sticking her head out of a window.”
When she declined, he “then grabbed her, pulled her hair as he pulled her towards the window of the room, and bent her over towards the window, while stating that he knew that (she) wanted to have sex in that manner,” the report stated.
She didn’t and later filed a complaint, prompting Hodge’s attorney to threaten a defamation lawsuit if she’d didn’t drop it and sign a non-disclosure agreement.
She didn’t and a hearing board suspended Hodge, barring him from campus for a semester.
Hodge insists he did nothing wrong, telling Pitzl that the encounter was consensual. “When she said ‘stop,’ I stopped,” he said.
But given the documentation, that ship has sailed.
The 28-year-old Boston woman contacted Pitzl in early January after learning through the internet that Hodge had been nominated to fill a legislative vacancy in Tempe.
“I didn’t want this to happen to anyone else,” she said. “And I don’t trust this person in a position of power.”
Pitzl promptly requested the records and, well, that was the end of Tempe’s political wunderkind.
The question is, why did the Democratic Party cover for this guy?
Hodge ran for Congress in 2022, losing to Rep. David Schweikert by less than 1% of the vote. A rematch was widely expected, yet in March 2023, Hodge abruptly announced he would not be running for Congress or any other office in 2024, citing financial and emotional stress.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that he got a call from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
The Boston woman confirmed to Pitzl that a friend had flagged the DCCC about the sexual attack and resulting banishment from campus, prompting a DCCC staffer to call her in early 2023.
Yet there he was, not even a year later, nominated by Democrats in January to fill a spot in the Arizona Legislature and ultimately appointed by the Republican-run Maricopa County Board of Supervisors.
I’d ask what vetting the Republicans did but then, I don't imagine the DCCC was burning up the phone lines to flag Hodge’s nomination.
This is — or should be — a major embarrassment to the Democratic Party.
Republicans certainly have had their share of legislators with skeletons dancing about their heads. Ex-Rep. David Stringer comes to mind. His political career was cut short in 2019 after a 35-year-old bombshell police report surfaced, accusing him of sex crimes involving boys. And then there's, well, that guy, Donald Trump.
Rep. Sun was a train wreck:Glad she resigned
But the timing of this is bad.
Democrats are making a play to gain control the Legislature in the fall elections. Yet they’re losing legislators at a steady clip, some due to political ambition or for career reasons. One (Rep. Leezah Sun), who resigned in January just ahead of a vote to toss her out for, among other things, threatening to kill a lobbyist.
Now Hodge, 48 days and done.
“We have accepted Representative Hodge’s resignation, which he offered in good faith and out of respect for our caucus, and we are prepared to move forward with the important business of the state,” House Minority Leader Lupe Contreras said in a statement.
Before you move forward, Rep. Contreras, perhaps you could explain how Democrats came to nominate a guy who records say wanted to have sex with an unwilling woman while her head was stuck out a window?
Did someone in the Arizona Democratic Party know about this?
And if not, then I’m wondering … why not?
Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter, at @LaurieRoberts or on Threads at laurierobertsaz.
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