Senator Amy Klobuchar vowed on Friday to ‘do better’ in how she treats her staff.
The Democrat from Minnesota, who is a candidate for her party’s nomination for president, has been the subject of a number of media stories from recent weeks quoting former staffers who say she can be abusive.
‘I’m incredibly proud of the work our staff has done and I would not be here without amazing staff,’ Klobuchar told the Star Tribune of Minneapolis on Friday.
‘I know I can be tough, I know I can push people too hard, and I also know I can do better - and I will.’
Staffers who once worked for Klobuchar have described behavior that is considered extreme even for demanding bosses.
The Star Tribune quoted former staffers who insisted on anonymity for fear that their comments would lead to retribution.
The ex-staffers repeated assertions made in recent weeks and recounted in numerous media outlets, including Klobuchar's alleged tendency to humiliate aides over relatively minor mistakes by berating them in front of colleagues and in some cases throwing objects at them.
The senator was often known to send angry emails to staffers well past midnight.
Senator Amy Klobuchar (second from left) greets local residents at a campaign stop in Nashua, New Hampshire on Sunday, February 24
'You’d wake up to a string of four, five, six, seven, eight e-mails of increasing anger, with everybody copied,' said one former aide.
'It was, "This is the worst thing I’ve ever seen. Naive. Stupid. Awful."
'It was just this vitriol. You didn’t wake up to it every single day, but it was enough that my stomach just clenched every morning the second I woke up.'
On February 22, The New York Times reported that Klobuchar once ate a salad with her comb and then asked a staff member whom she berated for not getting her a fork to clean it afterwards.
The incident allegedly took place at an airport in 2008 while Klobuchar was headed to South Carolina, four people with knowledge of the episode told the Times.
The aide was carrying the salad for his boss while also hauling their bags through an airport terminal when he accidentally dropped the plastic eating utensils.
After they reached the gate, Klobuchar reprimanded the staff member for not having a plastic fork ready for her to use.
She then allegedly stunned her team by using a comb to eat the salad. She then gave the comb to her aide and told her to clean it.
This was the latest in a series of revelations made in recent weeks about Klobuchar’s purported tendency to humiliate and mistreat her staff.
The claims are especially surprising given that Klobuchar has throughout her political career cultivated an image of ‘Minnesota nice’ that has endeared her to voters.
Klobuchar's treatment of staff has been an open secret in Washington, D.C. and in Minnesota, but her candidacy for president has shined a nationwide spotlight on the issue.
It has also called into question Klobuchar's fitness for the highest office in the land.
Zach Rodvold worked on Klobuchar's first U.S. Senate campaign in 2006. He also managed her Minnesota office from 2007 until 2009.
Rodvold admitted that the complaints from former staffers ring true.
'A lot of what’s been said about working for Amy is true,' he told the Star Tribune, though he added: 'I just don’t see it as something that’s disqualifying for running for president.'
‘The senator has repeatedly acknowledged that she can be tough and push people hard,’ Carlie Waibel, a campaign spokesperson for Klobuchar, told the Times.
‘But these anonymous stories - some of which are just plain ridiculous - do not overshadow the countless experiences of people on the senator’s team who she has been so proud to work with.’
At a recent town hall hosted by CNN, Klobuchar said that her tough demeanor is because of her ‘high expectations’ for her team.
‘Am I a tough boss sometimes? Yes,’ she said. ‘Have I pushed people too hard? Yes.’
The senator from Minnesota has been subject to a number of unflattering stories in the news media which quote former aides.
These ex-staff members say that they were on the receiving end of Klobuchar’s chiding, which came in response to relatively minor slip-ups.
Klobuchar’s treatment of her staff has attracted more attention in recent weeks as it became apparent that she would announce her candidacy for the presidency.
The Democratic senator made a formal announcement to that effect in Minneapolis on February 10.
Klobuchar’s tendency to humiliate and degrade her staff created a work environment permeated by fear, distrust, and paranoia, according to the Times.
Former staffers would not go on the record, fearing that Klobuchar would seek to retaliate against them.
They even saved damaging emails from Klobuchar to use as evidence in case the senator would try to ruin their reputations in Washington, D.C.
The ex-aides said Klobuchar would occasionally throw office supplies, including binder and telephones, at them in frustration.
Some say the senator would make them do tasks that were not part of their job requirement, like wash her dishes or pick up her dry cleaning.
Klobuchar would also fire off angry late-night emails and phone calls over minor errors, it has been alleged.
After a political event, a dissatisfied Klobuchar wrote in one email to staff: ‘In 20 years in politics I have never seen worse prep.’
Klobuchar tweeted a photo on February 10 of her out with her staff the night she officially announced her candidacy for president in Minnesota
In another angry email, she wrote: ‘This is the hands down worse thing you have ever given me.’
During an office meeting with staff, Klobuchar is alleged to have said: ‘This is the worst press staff I ever had.’
Staffers said this was something Klobuchar would repeat about both predecessors and successors in the office.
Klobuchar also ripped into her underlings for how they managed her social media account.
'We are becoming a joke,' she wrote in an email about the items posted on her Twitter feed, 'and it is making me a joke.'
The Times also reported that Klobuchar’s office had an unusual paid leave policy which forced employees to remain for three times as many weeks as they had been gone once they return.
Klobuchar’s office also required employees to pay back money earned during the weeks they were on leave, according to the Times.
Klobuchar’s office said that it would revise the paid leave policy.
‘We offer 12 weeks of paid maternity and paternity leave for our staff and have one of the strongest paid leave policies in the Senate,’ said spokeswoman Elana Ross.
‘We’ve never made staff pay back any of their leave and will be changing that language in the handbook.’
Still, there are those who defend Klobuchar.
Erikka Knuti, who once worked as a press aide to the senator, remembers being snapped at by her then-boss in front of another lawmaker in an elevator.
‘That wasn’t O.K.,’ a contrite Klobuchar told Knuti.
‘It made me feel valued,’ Knuti said.
Klobuchar has had among the highest rates of staff turnover in the Senate.
Her defenders say that she is being singled out because she is a woman, and that Capitol Hill is full of male lawmakers who are just as tough - if not more so - on their staff.
Jonathan Becker, who once worked as Klobuchar’s chief of staff, said the hard-charging senator forced staffers to raise their level of performance.
‘Isn’t that what the American people want in a president?’ Becker said.
‘They’re not looking for mashed potatoes.’
Link hienalouca.comhttps://hienalouca.com/2019/03/03/amy-klobuchar-vows-to-do-better-as-more-claims-by-ex-staffers-surface-alleging-abusive-behavior/
Main photo article Senator Amy Klobuchar vowed on Friday to ‘do better’ in how she treats her staff.
The Democrat from Minnesota, who is a candidate for her party’s nomination for president, has been the subject of a number of media stories from recent weeks quoting former staffers who say she can be abusive.
‘I’m ...
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Emily Ratajkowski is a showman, on and off the stage. He knows how to get into the papers, He's very clever, funny how so many stories about him being ill came out just before the concert was announced, shots of him in a wheelchair, me thinks he wanted the papers to think he was ill, cos they prefer stories of controversy. Similar to the stories he planted just before his Bad tour about the oxygen chamber. Worked a treat lol. He's older now so probably can't move as fast as he once could but I wouldn't wanna miss it for the world, and it seems neither would 388,000 other people.
Dianne Reeves US News HienaLouca
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