The Audacity of Grope: Filner’s new excuse is he never received sexual harassment training

Once I thought Professor Jacobson was America’s boldest lawyer, being a noted conservative pundit in a sea of blue academia.

He now has stiff competition from a San Diego employment attorney hired by Mayor Bob Filner to defend against claims of sexual harassment.  His lawyer argues that the city should pay his legal fees in the sexual harassment lawsuit because Filner never received the necessary preventative training required under the law.

California law requires all new managers to receive sexual harassment training within six months of being hired.“The city failed to provide such training to Mayor Filner,” Filner’s lawyer Harvey Berger wrote in a July 29 letter to City Attorney Jan Goldsmith. “In fact, it is my understanding that such training was scheduled, but the trainer for the city unilaterally cancelled, and never re-scheduled such training for the Mayor (and others.) Therefore, if there is any liability at all, the city will almost certainly be liable for ‘failing to prevent harassment’ under Government Code Section 12940(k).”Berger admits that the mayor never received any sexual harassment training while serving in Congress or in previous San Diego elected office.

A bold argument, that. I think the City Council and City Attorney, all of whom are current on their training, are going to reject this claim. But, I do admire its audacity.

I mentioned there were some concerns about dual recall petitions initiated by gay activist and Filner supporter Stampp Corbin and citizen activist Michael Pallamary. City Attorney Jan Goldsmith has determined both petitions can go forward, and the first one to collect the 100,000 plus signatures will be valid. As an extra bonus, both men have agreed to work together going forward:

“A lot of things get blown out of proportion because there were third parties talking about conversations,” said Pallamary, referring to comments made by a supposed friend of Corbin, Susan Jester who claims Corbin made fun of sabotaging Pallamary’s recall a week before starting his own campaign.“We’ve cleared the air and that’s between them,” stressed Pallamary.Now both men say they’re hoping to join forces and increase their chances to successfully recall Filner out of office.

Personally, many people in my San Diego Tea Party group are looking forward to promoting the petition effort. It’s a good thing, too. City Attorney Goldsmith also acknowledged San Diego has no impeachment process in its charter, so the recall process is the only real alternative to getting Filner’s resignation.

Additionally, Filner is also in hot water for a junket to France that is being investigated. The heat is so intense, the mayor has offered to reimburse the city for nearly $10,000 in expenses for a speech in Paris he gave to the Organization of Iranian-American Communities. It turns out the group is not a non-profit, as originally listed.

If these are examples of how former Congressman Filner learned to run things in Washington, D.C., our country is in deep, deep trouble.

(Hat-tip to Legal Insurrection fan Musson for the title inspiration)

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