A packet was left at my door recently and when I opened it, out poured a court case from 2006 where Democratic Congressional candidate Harley Rouda’s (CD-48) Ohio company lost a lawsuit to a former employee who sued because she was fired for being old and having a serious health issue.
Documents from the courts in Ohio and articles from Cleveland newspapers show that Lee-Ann Spacek was fired as vice president of relocation services for Real Living/Realty One in 2006. She was diagnosed with cancer and a rare blood disorder in 2004, yet continued to work for Rouda’s company. Allegedly, Rouda addressed employees at a company meeting in 2006 where he warmed that the company had “too many older employees” and their health insurance claims placed the company’s future in doubt.
Spacek was let go a year later and she sued. Rouda was dismissed from the lawsuit but a jury found in favor of Spacek and ordered Real Living/Realty One to pay Spacek about $1.85 million for lost wages, pain and suffering and punitive damages. A second employee, Bobbi Navarra, who was director of HR for Rouda’s firm, was also fired and she sued for age discrimination. Rouda’s wife Kaira was targeted in that suit which was settled out of court.
I reached out to Rouda via text last Thursday on this case and he did not respond.
I’m a business owner too, though my firm doesn’t scale to the numbers Rouda has. My employees are experienced people often with more than 25 years of experience. I value their experience and contribution to helping my business grow. Letting workers go because their are “too old” or “too sick” isn’t a Democratic value. Perhaps Rouda’s experience in California was different than the expensive lesson he learned in Ohio but voters need to call him on this one.
As candidates in CD-48 continue their debate, let’s hope Rouda can address these questions with voters in CD-48. And better this come out now so it can be addresses than wait for post-Labor day.
Not surprised a bit. He only became a Democrat a few months before running for congress in OC CD 48. He’s running against a CADEM endorsed candidate (which further splits the Dem vote and makes it harder to beat the two Repubs: Rohrabacher + Baugh) All along Rouda acts like the right to igore CADEM policy is some kind of patriotic right. The whole purpose of winning an endorsement is to support one candidate, to encourage the candidate who lost to that candidate to drop out and allow the winning candidate (in this case it is Hans Keirstead) to get full support. THIS IS NEVER MORE NEEDED IN HISTORY THAN NOW IN CD 48! But, nope. Leading up the the CADEM Dem. Convention Rouda personally pressured delegates to “vote no endorsement” to “honor all grassroots groups supporting him.” When asked by a delegate who those groups were, he said “people on my twitter feed.” Come on.
I agree with your statement.
Louise, I have followed your comments on other pages and I appreciate and respect you intellectual honesty. It’s discouraging to watch the groupthink robots come at you with all of those accusations simply because you present a reasonable, independent point of view. Harley’s campaign has been hijacked by a School Board thug named Gina Clayton-Tarvin and she leads the attacks that are launched on you and others. That is simply her Modus Operandi; to silence any/all views that get in the way of her personal agenda. A group of (mostly Dem) women in Huntington Beach have formed a small coffee group to talk about how she might be removed from office. It’s serious. We all applaud your candor. If you can’t have an honest discussion, then what is the point?
If the Republican party had their best minds working on ways to undermine the Democratic hopes for this district, they couldn’t have come up with anything better than what the Democratic Party has come up with themselves.
RE: Endorsements. It’s true that Keirstead wine’d and dine’d those 30 or so delegates much better than Harley did. He was new. He missed that boat. But at best the CADEM endorsement was a sneaky inside deal, and at worst it was . . . well much worse. (And anyone who was there knows that.) Also its important to note that core OC Congressional Representatives — Loretta Sanchez, Linda Sanchez, Alan Lowenthal and Lou Corea completely disregarded the silly party endorsement and endorsed Harley instead. Why do you think they did that? And its also important to note that Laura Oatman, who was a very credible and respected candidate for this office, saw how the Democrats were fragmenting themselves into irrelevance, stopped campaigning for herself and threw all her support to Harley. She knew these candidates better than anyone, and she saw that Harley had the best chance to win against Rohrbacher and she showed a character and leadership that is utterly absent in the other vanity candidates.
That isn’t true. I am one of the delegates. My decision was not because he invited the delegates to his home.
Mark, I agree totally. Interesting that Margo who reposted this slanderous , inaccurate, article says she found this article on her front porch! And Hans and his supporters have the nerve to say Harley ‘s campaign is pushing lies!
If the reporter would have done his work properly, he would have found that Harley was not charged with anything and I’ve worked in HR for years and sharing medical information on an employee is not allowed.
It’s in the story
I think it’s more interesting to note how much money Harley has donated to the GOP prior to entering this election. This isn’t just being on the sidelines of politics, this is actively funding a campaign to ensure that the Democrats didn’t take the White House. This is a history of voting red.
I don’t for one second believe that the GOP doesn’t have all this and isn’t waiting to blast it should Harley make it out of the primaries.
Discouraging all this Dem on Dem negativity…how about getting focused on Baugh and Dana? Geez…
For what it is worth this is what I have seen….
Here are the real facts:
At the time of this lawsuit in 2006, Real Living employed approximately 4,000 people. During the economic downturn many companies reduced their size in order to survive. Ms. Spacek worked for a Cleveland subsidary and was not directly managed by Harley Rouda. Harley was not involved in Ms. Spacek’s dismissal from the company, as evidenced by the Judge issuing a Directed Verdict, immediately dismissing Harley Rouda from this lawsuit. Additionally, Harley was not aware of her medical history as such records are confidential.
Harley is what I call a “Jose Moreno” Democrat.
One who stands on the sidelines for YEARS, and the registers BLUE shortly before announcing a run for a position where that affiliation would benefit.
Self serving, shallow and dishonest is another way to put it.
Harley Rouda first registered as a Democrat on 2/6/17 (a few weeks before launching his congressional campaign). Sincere political epiphany after years of contrary views, or shamelessly opportunistic maneuvering? I don’t know, but it’s hard to understand how a seemingly intelligent and informed individual could not discover their political identity until age 54.
Previously, Mr. Rouda spent decades of his adult life voting for, and donating to, Republicans. He then spent a few years timidly hiding behind a veil of “no party preference” status. Now, after following the directives of his expensive campaign consultants for one year, many people have become intoxicated by Harley’s public rhetoric, and that is enough to convince them that he is suddenly a bold champion of progressive values. If one objectively looks at the total context, however, his political body of work is thoroughly underwhelming.
Moreover, for him to assail Mr. Keirstead’s prior political participation is the kettle calling the pot black. For those who care to inquire about Mr. Rouda’s voting record, please call the Franklin County (Ohio) registrar of voters, and ask them which party Mr. Rouda voted for in the 2008 primary. Spoiler alert: the answer is not Democrat. That’s right…when Barack Obama was on the ballot, Rouda was voting for the other team. Tellingly, an honest accounting of this facts has not been publicly provided. Instead, stones are being thrown from glass houses.
is it any surprise he isn’t a democrat? letting a cancer patient go while lining his own pockets? c’mon. I don’t understand how he has ANY cred on healthcare at this point