Democratic Congressman Admits to Affair with Intern Just Before Crucial Primary, Throwing Election Up in the Air
Rep. Steven Horsford has admitted to having an affair with a staff intern weeks before a crucial primary election in Nevada on June 9.
“It is true that I had a previous consensual relationship with another adult outside of my marriage, over the course of several years,” the Nevada Democrat said in a statement, according to the Washington Examiner.
“I’m deeply sorry to all of those who have been impacted by this very poor decision, most importantly my wife and family. Out of concern for my family during this challenging time, I ask that our privacy is respected.”
The congressman is married and has three children.
Horsford made the statement in response to a local report that he had an affair with Gabriela Linder, a former intern of former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
Linder had told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that she is “Love Jones,” the pseudonym of a person who detailed her relationship with Horsford through a podcast called “Mistress for Congress.”
Linder met Horsford in 2009 when she was an intern in Reid’s Nevada office. She never worked for Horsford.
An aide for Horsford told the Review-Journal that “this was a private relationship of the congressman’s, and this was in no way related to his public office.”
According to Linder, the couple had a sexual relationship between 2009 and 2010, and again between 2017 and 2019, but they remained in regular contact throughout the decade.
She was 21 years old when they began their relationship and she alleges that Horsford used his status to take advantage of her.
“He knew how in love with him I was, and he knew what he could do and get away with,” she told the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
“He knows I would support him. He never told me to keep quiet. He didn’t have to. He knew I was loyal to a fault.”
Horsford won back his House seat in 2018 and will face off against five other Democrats in his swing district in Nevada’s primary election in three weeks.
Linder said that she sees her podcast as “an empowering journey” but she wasn’t trying to damage the representative’s reputation.
She told the Review-Journal that she thought Horsford should end his bid for re-election.
“If this was a story in 2018 [when Horsford recaptured the seat he lost in 2014], he wouldn’t have run,” Linder said.
“He obtained this position under false pretenses that he was a family man and man of God. He should take a step back, atone, and if people are satisfied, then he can come back into politics.”
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