A new minister faces charges of sexual violence. Damien Abad, deputy for Ain, former president of the Les Républicains group in the Assembly and now Minister of Solidarity, Autonomy and People with Disabilitiesis accused of rape by two women for alleged facts dating from 2010 and 2011, revealed Mediapart (paid item) Saturday May 21. Contacted by franceinfo, the Observatory of sexist and sexual violence in politics confirms having sent a “report by email” to La République en Marche and to the Republicans about these alleged facts. Franceinfo takes stock of what we know about these accusations against the 42-year-old elected official.
A complaint was dismissed in 2017
According to information from Mediapart, a 35-year-old former centrist activist has already filed a complaint for “rape” against Damien Abad, for the first time in 2012. But it was dismissed. “due to the plaintiff’s failure”, explains the Paris prosecutor’s office to franceinfo. A second complaint by this same woman and for the same alleged facts, filed five years later, was dismissed on December 5, 2017, “after a preliminary investigation, in the absence of a sufficiently serious offence”continues the prosecution.
This woman, then 22 years old and vice-president of the Young Democrats in Paris, met Damien Abad in 2009. At the time, the elected representative was a European deputy and chairs the Young Centrists-New Center. According to Mediapart, they met during a political meeting. Damien Abad would then, according to his account, “begins to [la] flirt by SMS”. The young woman describes several exchanges by messages with the chosen one, which she portrays as “very insistent”. “Come on, I’m waiting for your photo. Your face and your chest together”he would have written by text message, according to his testimony.
This woman then says that Damien Abad would have offered to see her one evening in January 2011 in Paris. “I felt a risk”, she testified to the police, according to information from Mediapart. That evening, the complainant claims to have had an imprinted sexual relationship “disrespect, injunction and insistence”, that she tries to stop with “innuendo”, avoidance. Then the young woman claims to have suffered an imposed anal penetration, despite a refusal pronounced in such a way “affirmed” and “Many times”, according to his testimony. In Mediapart, she also accuses the new minister of having “demanded a blowjob”. Damien Abad confirms to Mediapart that he was heard in the context of this investigation.
Another woman claims she was ‘drugged’
The second woman accusing the Minister of Solidarity, Autonomy and People with Disabilities addressed the Observatory of sexist and sexual violence in politics, created in February by several initiators of the #MeTooPolitique collective. In a letter sent on May 13 to the organization, she “wishes to testify to the facts of rape concerning Damien Abad, LR deputy for Ain, approached to join the government, and invested by Renaissance in Ain”.
The young woman tells Mediapart that she met Damien Abad in August 2010, during a wedding of friends in common. Several exchanges then began during the following months. The young woman portrays an elected “professionally interesting” but “heavy”. She claims to have explained to him that she “didn’t want to go out with him”.
During an evening in the fall of 2010, according to her story, this woman finds Damien Abad in a Parisian restaurant and bar.
“He offers champagne, I drank a glass. And there, blackout, until the next morning. It had never happened to me, especially not after a single glass.”
Woman accusing Damien Abad of rapeat Mediapart
She then claims to have woken up the next morning “in a hotel room near the bar” with Damien Abad, “in underwear”, “in a state of shock and deep disgust” and fears to have been “drugged”. “I felt cottony, my body was groggy, achy and sore, I knew something was wrong.”, she remembers, quoted by Mediapart. The young woman explains, in her description, that she “remains deeply affected by this experience”.
LREM and Les Républicains have been alerted
After receiving this letter, the Observatory of gender-based and sexual violence in politics sent her testimony to the management of LREM and LR, at the request of this woman. “We sent the report by email to Stanislas Guerini, Christophe Castaner, Bérangère Couillard and Aurélien Pradié”, specifies the organization to franceinfo. A report sent on Monday, May 16, followed by a follow-up “the 19 for LREM and the 20 for LR”.
According to information from Mediapart, the report sent to the two parties remained unanswered. The president of the LREM group in the National Assembly, Christophe Castaner, affirms to the investigation site that he has “received nothing” and having informed the public prosecutor’s office following the requests from Médiapart. Stanislas Guerini, the general delegate of La République en Marche, ensures that he has read the email from the Observatory of sexist and sexual violence in politics on Saturday morning, after being questioned by Mediapart. On the side of the Republicans, the secretary general of the party, Aurélien Pradié, replies that he has not “consulted the mailbox on which this alert was sent to him”. He claims to have nevertheless confronted Damien Abad in 2020, following testimonies “decinappropriate behavior he would have had with female collaborators”.
Contacted by franceinfo, the Paris prosecutor’s office confirms the information from Mediapart according to which the Observatory of gender-based and sexual violence in politics has also been transmitted to the public prosecutor of Paris. “It is being analyzed”says the prosecution.
Damien Abad refutes these accusations
Questioned by the investigation site, the new minister formally disputes the facts and holds “to affirm with force that the sexual relations that I have been able to have have always rested on the principle of mutual consent“. Comments reiterated on Sunday in a press release sent to franceinfo: Damien Abad “contest with the greatest force” accusations of sexual violence against him.
“I deny having exercised any form of coercion whatsoever on any woman. Finally, I deny any abuse of power related to the functions I have held.”
Damien Abadin a press release
“The sexual relationships I have had throughout my life have always been mutually consensual”insists the Minister of Solidarity, Autonomy and People with Disabilities.
Regarding the complaint against him, the deputy of Ain affirms to Mediapart that he is “physically impossible to commit the acts described” because of his disability. During the investigation, the chosen one described a relationship “agreed”asserting that there had been no “no violence, no aggressiveness, no moral constraint”. He granted possible “requests for [sa] go” during the report, but “at no time of physical or moral constraint”. As for the testimony addressed to the Observatory of gender-based and sexual violence in politics, the minister assures that he has not “obviously never drugged anyone” neither “never accompanied by a woman without her consent”. In his press release, he rejects remarks “inconceivable and abject”.
Elisabeth Borne “was not aware”
“Of course, I didn’t know.” During a trip to Thury-Harcourt, in Calvados, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne reacted to these accusations of rape targeting the Minister of Solidarity. The head of government claims to have “discovered the Mediapart article yesterday”. “I have no more elements than the fact that the case has been closed without further action”she continued in front of journalists.
“I can assure you that if there are new elements, if justice is again seized, we will draw all the consequences of this decision.”
Elisabeth Borne, Prime Ministertraveling in Calvados
“I will be very clear: on all these subjects of harassment, sexual assault, there can be no impunity”, warned the Prime Minister. Elisabeth Borne reiterated her desire to “continue to act so that women, who may be victims of aggression, harassment, can free their speech, that they are welcomed to file a complaint”.
In the majority as in the opposition, reactions are beginning to emerge. Asked about franceinfo, the LREM deputy from Paris, Gilles Le Gendre, replied that it was necessary “to be extremely scrupulous, with absolute respect for the word of possible victims, and also with the same level of scrupulousness, respect for procedures and authorities”. “At this stage I am neither informed nor competent to say more”he said.
LIVE Minister Damien Abad accused of rape: “At this stage I am neither informed nor competent to say more”, says Gilles Le Gendre, LREM deputy from Paris pic.twitter.com/gBij5oG7Cq
— franceinfo (@franceinfo) May 22, 2022
For his part, Julien Bayou, the national secretary of Europe Ecologie-Les Verts, estimated on the set of “Sunday in politics”, on France 3, that Damien Abad “should never have been named” because “From what I understand, it’s an open secret, his attitude towards women. (…) I call on the prosecutor to take action, so that there can be an investigation.” The leader of the rebels, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, in turn spoke on this subject on Sunday, during the “Grand Jury” RTL-Le Figaro-LCI. “There is a report that was made at an extremely high level of responsibility. They did not draw any conclusions from it before (…) Mr. Damien Abad could also draw personal conclusions from it”he commented.