Late Friday evening Washington State Senator Kevin Ranker, a Democrat representing Orcas Island, tendered his resignation, effective immediately, to Governor Jay Inslee, according to the Seattle Times.
In October of last year the Senate hired an investigator to look into allegations from Ann Larson, Ranker’s former legislative aide and the current director of government relations at the Department of Enterprise Services, who claimed her former boss “made unwanted advances, touched her inappropriately and seemed to grow increasingly angry as she rebuffed him” during the 2010 session.
When she told officials in the Senate about this behavior at the time, they didn’t do anything except help her find a new job as a legislative liaison for the Department of Fish and Wildlife. While she was there, the Times reports, Ranker allegedly “continued to make advances, threatened to cut [her] department’s budget, looked up her salary and told her she was overpaid, examined which state authorizations allowed her job in the first place and threatened to cut programs important to her.” The Times also has a text from Ranker to Larson, wherein he “threatened to work to eliminate the Fish and Wildlife Commission, which had appointed Larson’s boss.” The Senate wasn’t even going to launch an investigation into any of this until Larson told the governor’s office she was thinking about going public.
Larson told the Times she had “a brief consensual relationship with Ranker” in 2008 when she was a clerk for the San Juan County Commissioner and he was one of the commissioners. After being elected to the Senate, Ranker hired Larson later in the 2009 session. Ranker acknowledged the relationship with Larson in Northwest News Network.
In a letter to his constituents in the 40th LD, Ranker apologized “for any stress” he caused Larson, saying, “I wish her peace.”
Larson told the AP she was happy to move on. “I hope that by my actions, more people feel safe to report any kind of inappropriate behavior without fear of retaliation,” she wrote.
In a statement, Senate Majority Leader Andy Billig thanked Ranker for his service, declined to comment during an ongoing investigation, and added that the “Senate remains committed to creating and fostering a safe, inclusive workplace for everyone.”
Tara Parker, an attorney at the Ogden Murphy Wallace law firm, has been conducting the investigation.
Aaron Wasser, director of communications for the Senate Democrats, told me senators anticipate being briefed on the results of the investigation this Thursday. Ranker and Larson will be briefed shortly after that. They both have two weeks to decide if they want to appeal the report, though they both can waive that right to appeal. If one of them appeals, though, the Senate’s Facilities and Operations Committee would take up the claim and decide within 30 days on further action. If no one appeals, the Secretary of the Senate will post the full report online.
