Sexual harassment allegations have been amplified online by Democrat-aligned politicos targeting Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., one of the leading Democratic candidates in California’s gubernatorial race.
Amid repeated denials and cease-and-desist letters sent by Swalwell’s lawyer, one of the alleged victims shared her story publicly for the first time, accusing Swalwell of taking advantage of her while she was intoxicated on multiple occasions, according to a bombshell report published by the San Francisco Chronicle Friday.
The alleged victim’s story also included claims that Swalwell pressured her to send naked pictures of herself and sent sexually explicit photos of his own, pulled out his private parts while driving in a car with her and requested she perform oral sex on him, among other incidents the victim said affected how Swalwell treated her professionally.
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The unnamed female accuser, who spoke to the San Francisco Chronicle, reportedly worked for Swalwell for about two years and revealed that he started pursuing her, despite being married, shortly after she was hired as a 21-year-old staffer in his district office.
On multiple occasions, the young staffer recalls blacking out from alcohol consumption, before waking up naked in Swalwell’s hotel bed with signs she had engaged in intercourse. Swalwell allegedly distanced himself after the incident, and their relationship faded, before they reunited when she no longer worked for him when another incident allegedly took place.
“Eric Swalwell should immediately drop out,” Democratic strategist Bhavik Lathia said after the San Francisco Chronicle’s report dropped. “It is damning.”
Matt Mahan, a former San Jose Mayor and fellow Democratic Party gubernatorial candidate in California, also called on Swalwell to “drop out.”
“To the survivor who risked everything to come forward – I believe you,” Mahan said. “To the Democratic Party – you’d better hold him accountable.
“If we don’t, we have no credibility asking anyone else to do the same.”
Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., a longtime friend of Swalwell who faced backlash earlier this week for trying to discredit allegations against the California Democrat, posted on Friday that he “regret[s] having come to his defense on social media prior to knowing all the information. I am equally as shocked and upset about what has transpired.”
“What is described is indefensible. Women who come forward with accounts like this deserve to be heard with respect, not questioned or dismissed,” Gallego said. “I am withdrawing my endorsement of Congressman Swalwell, effective immediately.”
Swalwell’s team did not respond to Fox News’ request for comment, but he recently said during a press gaggle that the allegations are “false,” including allegations that Swalwell previously pressured female staffers to sign non-disclosure agreements so they cannot speak out or that he was involved in an alleged hush money settlement.
“It’s false. And also some of the allegations I’ve seen, which is that we’ve had NDAs in the office – never. There’s never been an allegation, and there’s never been a settlement,” Swalwell insisted this week.
“This false, outrageous rumor is being spread 27 days before an election begins by flailing opponents who have sadly teamed up with MAGA conspiracy theorists because they know Eric Swalwell is the frontrunner in this race,” Micah Beasley, a spokesperson for Swalwell, also said Tuesday.
Cheyenne Hunt, a former Capitol Hill staffer who is a nonprofit director at the group Gen-Z for Change, is among the voices acting as a proxy for alleged Swalwell accusers and has been helping amplify their stories.
On Friday, she blasted Swalwell for “tak[ing] a page out of the Trump playbook by attempting to silence women” with cease-and-desist letters he allegedly sent out late Thursday night ahead of the San Francisco Chronicle’s report sharing a first-hand account from one of Swalwell’s alleged accusers.
Fox News Digital has not independently verified the allegations from the report.
The alleged victim, who began working for Swalwell during his short-lived presidential campaign in 2019, said a married Swalwell, who was 38, began pursuing her, including through messages on Snapchat, which allows users to send photos that subsequently disappear after someone has looked at them.
She claimed the relationship rapidly progressed as Swalwell began asking for pictures of her face, then her naked body and eventually her genitalia. When messaging, the victim alleged Swalwell would sometimes send shirtless selfies or other images of his own genitalia.
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Swalwell then allegedly tried to kiss the victim in her car when she drove him home from a donor meeting one night. On another occasion, he allegedly pulled out his penis while in the vehicle and asked her to perform oral sex on him. She admitted to doing so in a parking lot but soon stopped out of fear someone might see them.
In September 2019, the alleged victim, who was then working in Swalwell’s Castro Valley district office, reportedly said Swalwell invited her out for dinner and drinks when she drank too much and blacked out.
She claimed to have not even remembered leaving the restaurant but woke up in Swalwell’s hotel room the next day with vaginal soreness indicative of sexual intercourse. She also reportedly had a brief memory of Swalwell sucking her toes.
After the alleged September 2019 incident in Swalwell’s hotel room, the victim said the pair’s relationship faded as Swalwell distanced himself from her and began treating her more formally during public interactions. She eventually stopped working for Swalwell but stayed in politics and noted Swalwell would occasionally remain in touch with her, including reaching out when she was looking for a job.
However, she claimed that, five years later, while attending an April 2024 charity event Swalwell was being honored at, the pair reunited. She was not working for Swalwell at this later date, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. The woman indicated that she and Swalwell went out for drinks after the event, during which she once again became inebriated and could only remember bits and pieces about the night.
“Even though he had hurt me in the past, I felt like he was someone I could trust,” the alleged victim said, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. “Because we shared this secret together, it pulled me closer to him.”
According to the San Francisco Chronicle’s reporting on the alleged victim’s experiences, one moment she did remember from the night was pushing Swalwell away and telling him “no” as he allegedly tried to force her to have sex with him. The woman reportedly texted a friend after the incident telling her she had been sexually assaulted by Swalwell. Other messages reviewed by the San Francisco Chronicle reportedly showed the victim indicating she had “blacked out” but “woke up once during it and even told him to stop at one point.”
“This happened one other time when I was working with him, but I convinced myself I was an equal party in it even though same pattern: I blacked out and he had sex with me,” the alleged victim wrote, referring to the 2019 incident, according to the San Francisco Chronicle’s reporting.
The outlet also indicated it spoke with the friend the victim was allegedly texting and the woman’s boyfriend whom she reportedly told about the assault the next day. The boyfriend reportedly encouraged her to report Swalwell at the time.
However, she did not go to the authorities at the time, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, because she was afraid she would not be believed. Medical records reportedly showed she did obtain a pregnancy and STD test a week after the incident.
Swalwell subsequently messaged the alleged victim after the 2024 incident and told her not to tell anyone about their interaction that night, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
“He even sent me a message: you said you didn’t remember anything last time i hope you do now,” the alleged victim reportedly texted her friend three days after the incident. “And i said: yeah I’m trying to forget thanks.”
“He was sending messages like we just had a romantic encounter like he knows what he’s doing,” the alleged victim also allegedly wrote to her friend at the time. “He was gaslighting me into thinking it was consensual.”
Swalwell’s alleged victim began talking to the San Francisco news outlet roughly a month ago, while weighing whether to go public with her allegations as they began anonymously surfacing online.
The victim was confused how the rumors began, considering she only told family and a small group of friends about the incident. The victim reportedly called the Swalwell campaign in March to see if her name had surfaced among the rumored victims, and one of Swalwell’s staffers reportedly asked her to vouch for Swalwell.
“He was so confident that I would stay silent that he wasn’t scared,” she said of Swalwell.
“I have no skin in the game of who becomes governor of California, but I feel people have a right to know whether the person who leads a state that is a safe haven for so many women actually treats women with dignity and will protect their rights,” the woman, who still works on Capitol Hill, said, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
“No one protected me from him, and so I have to protect the other young women like me who aspire to work in this field and he could prey upon.”
Late Thursday night, Swalwell’s attorney, Elias Dabaie, sent a cease-and-desist letter that Hunt, one of the individuals amplifying Swalwell’s accuser’s claims, argues is an effort to intimidate those trying to speak up about Swalwell’s history with women.
“Today we learned [Swalwell] is intimidating survivors, serving cease and desist letters on those coming forward with stories of sexual harassment and abuse. He sent this threat in the dead of night — another attempt to delay the truth,” Hunt wrote on social media, attaching a copy of the first letter of the cease and desist letter she claimed to have obtained.
“This is what it looks like when powerful men get caught,” Hunt continued. “These cease and desists are a disgusting abuse of power against brave women who are courageously working together to share their stories. It begs the question: if Swalwell has done nothing wrong, as his campaign claims, why not let the women tell their stories in the light of day? Our team remains steadfast. We will not relent. The women will not recant.”
The Los Angeles Times reported Friday that it had confirmed the authenticity of the letter. Fox News Digital reached out to the attorney who sent the letter to confirm the authenticity of the letter independently but did not immediately receive a response.
After the San Francisco Chronicle’s report Friday, CNN published a separate report indicating three other women it had spoken to also alleged various kinds of sexual misconduct by the Democratic congressman, including Swalwell sending them unsolicited explicit messages or nude photos.
