The state’s Legislative Ethics Commission voted unanimously on Thursday to publish a report outlining an investigation into the conduct of disgraced ex-state Rep. Harry Benton, who resigned earlier this month amid allegations of sexual harassment, but a state law giving Benton a chance to comment on the report means it likely won’t be released until month’s end.
The decision by the eight-member commission, composed of four Democratic and four Republican lawmakers, marks the first time the legislative inspector general’s office has been authorized to release an investigative report since 2020.
“Concerning the complaint against former Rep. Harry Benton, we voted to publish the report pursuant to our statutory obligations,” Republican state Rep. Jeff Keicher of Sycamore, who chairs the commission, said in a prepared statement. “To protect the privacy of those involved in this case, the respondent and complainant will be given the opportunity to review the report for potential redactions, which the Commission will review.”
Keicher also said that since the commission has voted to publicize the report, the State Officials and Employees Ethics Act requires the parties involved in the complaint, including Benton, to be allowed to review it, offer redaction suggestions and provide a response to be published alongside the report if they wish.
While Keicher did not say exactly when the report would be released, he said the commission intends to complete this review process by next Friday, July 31.
In a prepared statement, House Republican leader Tony McCombie of Savanna thanked the commission for its decision, saying “transparency is key for us to move forward, understand how we can improve, and to demand accountability for those who failed to uphold the integrity of our chamber.”
Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch — who, along with Gov. JB Pritzker, advocated for the report’s release — said in a statement that the vote was “a positive step for accountability and transparency, and I look forward to the full report being released this month.”
Commission members have remained mum on any details of the report, but it is not expected to focus on a former Benton staffer and her complaint to Welch’s office in 2023, which were detailed in a Tribune investigation, because it falls past a one-year statute of limitations for the legislative inspector general to consider findings. The report is expected, however, to note her allegations against Benton to show a pattern of harassment dating back to his first days in office.
Instead, the report is expected to detail a lobbyist’s interaction with Benton that occurred earlier this year. Welch’s office filed a complaint with the legislative inspector general’s office seeking an investigation of Benton after it had received reports of the Plainfield Democratic lawmaker’s conduct toward the lobbyist.
While Welch contends the report will vindicate what his office did regarding the former staffer’s complaint, the statute of limitations makes it highly unlikely the legislative inspector general’s report will adjudicate the propriety of the speaker’s actions, which the House Democratic Women’s Caucus said were “insufficient.” Instead, the report is expected to detail the lobbyist’s interaction with Benton.
Republican state Sen. Jil Tracy of Quincy, a member of the Legislative Ethics Commission, has said the Tribune account of what transpired was “worse” than what was contained in the legislative inspector general’s investigatory report.
In her statement Thursday, McCombie said, “Unfortunately, we may never know what happened before this report due to the silence of leaders who have repeatedly chosen politics over principles.”
The report’s contents have been long-awaited. So far, the most detailed account of the allegations involving Benton has come from the Tribune investigation first published online July 17 that raised questions about how Welch’s office handled allegations made by the young female staffer shortly after Benton began his first term in office.
The woman’s allegations of harassment, many of them of a sexual nature, were made in April 2023, but she declined to file a complaint with the legislative inspector general’s office, telling the Tribune she didn’t want to be known as a “problematic staffer” since she was, at the time, ambitious to pursue a career in government and politics. She did, however, put Welch’s office on notice with the allegations and told his staff that she didn’t want what happened to her to happen to other women.
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The woman stopped working for Benton in mid-2023. Welch’s office has since defended its handling of the 2023 case, telling the Tribune it acted “promptly” and that “appropriate action was taken” — though prepared statements from his office did not specify what, if any, disciplinary action occurred against Benton three years ago.
The woman’s claims, though, resurfaced after at least one other person came forward this year with more recent harassment allegations against Benton, sparking discipline from Welch and an investigation by Legislative Inspector General Michael McCuskey.
In that case, the Tribune learned, a female lobbyist accused Benton of making lewd comments toward her at a Chicago bar and other inappropriate behavior. While the investigation was underway, Welch sidelined Benton from his committee assignments and other key Democratic caucus duties.
Earlier this month, Benton resigned his legislative seat and withdrew his bid for reelection after McCuskey delivered the private report to Welch in response to a complaint Welch’s office filed earlier this year regarding Benton’s behavior.
This week, Welch has gone on the defensive in response to the Tribune investigation, holding meetings with several Democratic female lawmakers to discuss his office’s handling of the 2023 allegations and other issues raised in the reporting, according to several lawmakers who attended those virtual meetings.
Several Democratic House members who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid repercussions told the Tribune that Welch told them his office waited three months after the female Benton staffer notified his office of a lengthy list of harassment allegations before taking any action because the young woman said she wanted the speaker’s office to wait until she had left her job. However, the woman told the Tribune on Tuesday she didn’t recall telling the speaker’s office that those were her wishes.
Welch also told lawmakers in the meetings that the office had acted to respect the former staffer’s wishes not to “pursue” action against Benton. But she has told the Tribune that was in reference to her rejecting Welch’s office’s push for her to file a report with the legislative inspector general’s office. She has said she preferred that Welch’s office handle the matter internally and further stated that she didn’t want other women to face harassment from Benton in the future.
The Tribune also revealed that Welch had interactions with the former Benton staffer on social media — which included him responding with heart-eye emojis to images of her — as well as a request over the encrypted Signal messaging app to meet in the bar area of a suburban restaurant. The young woman once interned in Welch’s office and, according to the speaker’s spokesperson, he and the woman had a “cordial friendship,” though the communications in question did not occur while she was still interning for the office. The former staffer has told the Tribune the emoji responses from Welch made her feel “uncomfortable.”
In at least one meeting with lawmakers this week, Welch told them he was wrong to send the emojis but said he often meets people at the restaurant.
On Wednesday, Pritzker noted Welch had been discussing the Benton matter with several lawmakers in the internal meetings, but the governor urged Welch to be more open with the public about what he knew and when.
“Now, the speaker has a responsibility to be utterly and completely transparent about the situation to make sure that he is letting the public know, as well as, in particular, his members know exactly what happened, and to the extent that he made mistakes, to own up to those mistakes,” Pritzker said.
Following Thursday’s vote, Democratic state Rep. Kelly Cassidy of Chicago, another member of the Legislative Ethics Commission, noted the Benton saga has caused “a fair bit of discussion” about how the commission and the legislative inspector general’s office are bound by state laws governing their work.
She said she welcomed those discussions in the months ahead and said it was important to note that the most substantive changes to those laws in recent years occurred under former Speaker Michael Madigan, “who consistently fought efforts to allow the (legislative inspector general) to operate with true independence” following a #MeToo scandal in 2017 and 2018.
“While important improvements were made in 2019, there is a great deal more that should have been done then to ensure that victims are able to safely seek justice,” Cassidy said in a statement. “I urge my colleagues to be bold in their proposals to improve our response to misconduct, and take this opportunity to embrace best practices informed by the need to create a safe and equitable working environment for everyone who comes to our Capitol.”
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