Virginia politicians have been the subject of multiple scandals, with Governor Ralph Northam and state Attorney General Mark Herring facing blackface controversies and now Lt. Governor Justin Fairfax is fighting back against sexual assault allegations.
The African-American Virginia Democrat sounded off on allegations of sexual assault on Sunday calling the accusations a ‘political lynching.’
“If we go backward, and we rush to judgment and we allow for political lynchings without any due process any facts any evidence being heard, then I think we do a disservice to this very body in which we all serve,” Fairfax told state Senators.
This past Friday, state legislators invited Fairfax’s accusers to publicly testify against the embattled politician. Many Democrats in the state have already demanded that Fairfax step down from his position despite the fact that he denies all claims against him.
One of Fairfax’s accusers claims that the Lt. Governor assaulted her at the Boston Democratic National Convention in 2004, but Fairfax claimed that the encounter was consensual according to the New York Times.
“We hit it off, she was very interested in me, and so eventually, at one point, we ended up going to my hotel room,” he told the newspaper.
The second accuser, Meredith Watson, claims that she was assaulted by the now 40-year-old during their undergraduate years at Duke University in 2000. According to the Washington Post, Watson shared the story with close friends around the time that the incident occurred.
Fairfax has denied both accusations and has shown no signs to resign despite the many calls for him to do so.
