Alaska attorney general resigns after reports of hundreds of texts to female employee
Alaska Attorney General Kevin Clarkson resigned on Tuesday after a news report showed he’d sent hundreds of text messages to an younger female employee, including 18 that asked her to come to his home.
The joint investigation by ProPublica and Anchorage Daily News found that Clarkson sent 558 text messages — some that included a kiss emoji — to the employee in March. Over 27 days, Clarkson reportedly asked her to come to his home 18 times.
“You’re beautiful ... sweet dreams. Sorry to bother you,” Clarkson texted on March 16, according to the report. The next day, he wrote: “So what are you doing sweet lady?”
Clarkson acknowledged sending the text messages in a statement.
“I engaged in a series of text messages with this employee over approximately one month. The topics of these texts ranged from food, to movies, to books, to family, and all were conversational and positive, were reciprocal, and were, I believed, mutual,” Clarkson said in a statement to Channel 2. “I sent her pictures of food that I cooked from time to time. These texts included invitations for this person and her children to come to my home to share a meal, which she politely declined.”
Clarkson said the text messages were “G-rated” and that he was not her supervisor.
“When this person eventually expressed her discomfort to me, I immediately respected her wishes and ceased communicating with her by text,” Clarkson said in the statement. She appropriately reported this situation to her supervisor, and I immediately and fully cooperated in the ensuing process, and have accepted the finding that my actions, however unintentionally, created an uncomfortable workplace environment for this employee.”
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy accepted Clarkson’s resignation, The Wall Street Journal reported.
“Kevin Clarkson has admitted to conduct in the workplace that did not live up to our high expectations, and this is deeply disappointing,” Dunleavy said. “This morning he took responsibility for the unintentional consequences of his actions and tendered his resignation to me. I have accepted it.”
The employee declined to comment or provide texts for the report.
Clarkson took a leave of absence starting Aug. 1 and was expected to return to work on Sept. 1, Anchorage Daily News reported.
Clarkson is an attorney in Anchorage and helped write a 1998 constitutional amendment that defined marriage as between a man and a woman, according to The Wall Street Journal.
This story was originally published August 25, 2020 at 5:39 PM with the headline "Alaska attorney general resigns after reports of hundreds of texts to female employee."