Pa. Rep. Mike Zabel resigns amid sex harassment allegations
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — State Rep. Mike Zabel, accused of sexually harassing several women, announced his resignation on Wednesday, effective March 16.
As KDKA-TV political editor Jon Delano reports, the announcement came amidst another charge from a local state representative and growing pressure on Pennsylvania's first woman Speaker of the House to act.
In a short note to House Speaker Joanna McClinton, Zabel, a Delaware County Democrat, said he was resigning next week to "focus on my family and my health."
Several women had accused Zabel of harassment over a four-year period, but his resignation came just hours after state Rep. Abby Major, an Armstrong County Republican, described her harassment from Zabel this past year.
"On this particular evening, Representative Zabel and I were standing next to each other at the bar. I was attempting to pay my tab when he began to tell me how fantastic I looked, how he could really tell that I had lost a lot of weight, and that I just looked great," recounted Major.
"I told him, thank you, but he continued pressing the issue, eventually putting his arm around me and touching my back."
Major said she rejected Zabel's request to "go upstairs." and said Zabel seemed to stalk her as she tried to leave. So she went back in and asked a colleague to escort her to her car.
"As we were opening the doors to step outside, I noticed that Representative Zabel was again behind us. I was stunned. I left for the evening disturbed by the situation," said Major.
In office for just a week, state House Speaker McClinton was feeling the heat from her colleagues calling on her to demand Zabel's resignation, something he refused to do at first.
"There were private discussions out of the public with the representative in question, and the representative decided not to resign," said McClinton.
McClinton was going to let the process play out with the House Ethics Committee conducting an investigation of the charges against Zabel, but Zabel's resignation ends that.
Both sides accuse each other of playing politics because of the narrow majority the Democrats have in the house.
Delano: "The Republicans say that you, the Democrats, knew all about this a long time ago and did nothing. True?"
McClinton: "That's absolutely not true."
Even with Zabel's resignation, the Democrats still have a one-vote majority because a Republican representative resigned recently to become a state senator.
It's likely both those seats will be filled at the May primary. If Republicans were to win both, they would take back control of the House.