When Radack Met Fitzgibbon: Me Too or Et Tu?

On the 20th of December 2015, Jesselyn Radack, a whistleblower and attorney, texted a message to Trevor Fitzgibbon, head of a major progressive PR firm, as part of a seemingly earnest and empathic conversation:

...sexual harassment and sexual assault are not really about sex, but about power.

At that point in the conversation, Radack seemed more inclined to regard her two meetings with Fitzgibbon in prior weeks as being matters of sex, rather than power. Yet three months later she alleged that one was an occasion of sexual assault, and the other of rape.

The common notion of consent between adults is of something evidenced to each other by conduct at the time and in the immediate aftermath. It is also generally taken to be clearest to the one who gives or withholds it, if uncertainty applies. But if Radack genuinely felt in March 2016 that she was subject to sexual intercourse “without her permission and against her will,” then she did not settle on this conclusion till a month or more after the relevant event in early December.

Later on the day of this pivotal encounter, she remarked his prowess in a sportive and candid way. After raising his promotion of her on social media, she apologizes for missing something that she thought he overlooked, and thanks him a second time in all caps. He replies with “totally” and “I'm no fool.” She answers: “Certainly not. I'm REALLY sore. Haven't been fucked like that ever.”

There are records from the Lombardy Hotel that accord with the dates of those messages on the 1st of December. In late December she refers to the Lombardy occurrence as one of their only two sexual engagements, at different locations. Yet despite being categorically excluded by this, her allegation in March was that he raped her there on the 8th of December.

Nor could he have been guilty of sexual assault in her Washington office on the 4th of December, which is the date on the original police record for that lesser allegation. In May 2018, Kevin Gosztola had reported that Fitzgibbon had an alibi of hotel records in Texas covering this day and the two either side.

So Fitzgibbon has a very solid case against each allegation as dated on the original police record.

Two months after Gosztola's article, Radack said in a deposition that there was an error on the police record and that she had specified the sexual assault as on the 4th of November, rather than the 4th of December.

Yet there is public evidence that between these dates, on the 15th of November, Radack sexted Fitzgibbon, leading to their meeting at the Lombardy Hotel.

She is thus calling something sexual assault despite it occurring before her sexting in the same month to the alleged culprit, which does not seem easy to frame as a credible position, to say the least.

Momentum of Me Too

On the 19th of December, the Guardian published a story that includes the following, which quotes an anonymous lawyer who is not Radack.

"I didn’t think to myself that this was dangerous serial behaviour that he was probably doing to other women, or that he was keeping us silent by giving us a guilt trip.”

Fitzgibbon invited her up to his room in the Bowery hotel in New York, the lawyer alleges, saying they had sensitive client work to discuss which was best done in private. While she was talking on her cellphone inside the room he allegedly grabbed at her from behind, and had to be repulsed.

"I brushed it off as I thought he was having a needy moment,” she said. “I can now see so clearly why women don’t speak out more frequently and immediately – even women who are strong and independent like me.”

Radack referred to this with agitation: “Aside from my office, the only other time was at the Lombardy hotel, not the Bowery. If you can even keep these incidents straight. How many others. Trevor? You swore I was the only one.”

In the text here from the Guardian as well as the response from Radack, one implicit notion is rather salient: sexual offences may not be clear as such without being seen as part of an established pattern.

There is nothing to rule out the legitimacy of such a mode of evaluation in general, yet by the same token, nothing to legitimate every conclusion it might inspire.

One relevant liability is a snowballing effect of articulated suspicion and resentment, and a transfer of such momentum to Radack is beyond question here.

The woman in the story indicates that for a while she regarded Fitzgibbon's alleged actions as an expression of neediness, rather than an instance of abuse, and that she had not initially thought of it as dangerous behaviour. She further implies that it was the sort of thing for which women could easily be made to feel guilty, as opposed to wholly unambiguous assault.

Fitzgibbon never claimed perfect innocence, and assault is more than mere impropriety. In the same conversation with Radack, which continued in very amicable terms, he confesses to intermittent boundary problems and a tendency to lapse into egoism. With respect to physical violations he maintains that this was never worse than inappropriate hugs.

Change of Tune

The relevant background of tension and confusion is encapsulated in Radack's message on or after the 30th of December: “It's hard to reconcile the “Two sides of Trevor.” Sometimes good people make bad choices.”

Radack had referred to disturbing similarity in the allegations to her own experience, with respect to things like being pulled “onto his lap” in her office.

She also noted allegations as being from those of lesser status, and asked Trevor, “How could it be 100% consensual with junior staff, women seeking employment, etc.”

Narrative may be the villain in this context and speculative dots should only be joined with caution. Yet we should not rule out that Radack reappraised bold aspects of his physical engagement with her, along with suspicion that he misled her about being the only one, as factors in a power asymmetry resulting in her exploitation.

She might then have taken this as rendering their sexual contacts non-consensual, in a way that only appeared so in retrospect, through reversal of her previous impressions.

Such revision might be legitimate in cases where sex ensues on the basis of radically false pretexts, for instance, when a spy plays a fabricated role to take systematic advantage of trust.

Though Radack enquired about him deceiving her concerning simultaneous affairs, Fitzgibbon maintained that he did not do so, and was never accused of an outrageous pretext.

So all that could remain of Radack's premise is that she was subject to mildly inordinate or deceptive sexual engagement, and that this was additionally a violation of her consent, as determined no sooner than month later and in striking contradiction to the sum of her direct signals before then.

If claims of sexual violence could be justified on such a premise there would be drastic implications for the tangibility of sexual consent.

Boundary issues that are only determined retrospectively are naturally even harder for the other to anticipate at the time, especially when it comes to the fuzzy scope and weight of things like physical boldness or being the only one, according to unspecified criteria, in a mutually extramarital dalliance.

If future opinions on such vagaries were pivotal to consent then most sex would involve partners incapable of determining permission. All other things being equal, half of all sexual activity would then be criminal.

Such an absurd notion of consent could only be useful for unjust accusation, however it might seem to accusers who resort to it.

Another hypothesis is that Radack brazenly lied about events and/or dates, perhaps to obscure her trail in the latter case. Nothing clearly excludes this. Yet dates can be lost track of, and the campaign against Fitzgibbon cannot be fully explained by any one person's deceit.

Vilification

Fitzgibbon was never charged in connection with Radack's allegations or any others, yet the smearing of him continues. She is in contempt of court for not keeping silent on the issue after having issued a retraction of all relevant statements as part of a settlement.

The impact of the allegations they discussed had forced him to close his business, and it is obviously understated to say that he has not been well placed to resume where he left off in the field of public relations.

It's never hard to see when moral condemnation is worse than its embodied target, if it issues from ideals we reject. Yet many are oblivious to that malaise in connection with values they embrace.

Unjust action is often bound up with distorted perception. But whether or not Radack felt somehow justified in making the allegations against Fitzgibbon, her text messages show beyond reasonable doubt that they were false.

Having provided such testimony to a federal attorney, Radack could face 5yrs in prison for perjury. So she has ample motive to avoid being held to account for this, and thereby to distract from it by continuing to demonize Fitzgibbon and anyone who reasonably comments on the allegations against him.

Since the initial allegations against Fitzgibbon, much has been made of the plurality of accusers. Yet peripheral allegations of sexual misconduct can do nothing to redeem a sole accusation of rape when the accuser's own words establish that the relevant sex was arranged by both parties and had a congenial aftermath.

On the contrary, the status of Radack allegations prompts reconsideration of the import of less serious ones. The campaign to deprive Fitzgibbon of presumption of innocence has come unstuck, which makes the burden of proof heavier than normal for any claim that he is guilty of more than he admits to.

It is inevitable that vindication of anyone alleged to have been guilty of a sexual offence will be to the advantage of those who are similarly innocent, and that actual rapists will undeservedly share in the same benefit.

Regardless of how needful or noble an invoked cause may be, cheap or blind activism can set it back, and sadly this is also true in the fight against sexual violence.

Appendix

The justice system in this case appears to be weighing evidence correctly, despite Radack's allies on social media crusading with loaded terms, non-sequiturs, insinuating diagrams and invective-laced narrative.

Since it is in the public interest to have this matter clarified, primary evidence for details above is appended below.

Every word of the included text messages reflects a situated individual responding significantly in real time, and the personalities of the two individuals are expressed as clearly as they are in other forums. There is nothing to hint at fabrication, such as notably streamlined dialog, a global style or the subtle discontinuities of inserted material. All essential and incidental aspects of the correspondence tally with known facts and cohere as an integral whole with a convincing depth that, if possible, would be a remarkable achievement as a fraudulent artefact.

Radack also effectively verified her sexting by describing Fitzgibbon's inclusion of it in his lawsuit as “revenge porn.” Yet after a judge dismissed that characterization, and she had agreed to retract every allegation in May 2019, Radack publicly claimed to have “been the victim of deepfakes—doctored vids, texts, images, etc—weaponized against me by a serial predator.” One of the more respected of her longstanding vocal supporters on this issue has nonetheless, in February 2020, taken the relevant sexted images, posted by other women as a public interest defence of Trevor, to be genuine photos of Radack.

The SMS messages below are sequentially dated over six weeks, beginning with the sexting, and are in perfect synchrony with articles they mention that were published at the time.

To reiterate, she maintains that he sexually assaulted her on the 4th of November, which is eleven days before she sexted him. Without discrediting her sanity, it cannot be taken seriously that she was subject to a grave sexual offence already perpetrated by the intended recipient of that sexting. So even excluding all their other messages, there is overwhelming evidence of false witness on her part.

Doubling down on smearing Fitzgibbon and other distractions is thus unlikely to be effective or sustainable, however prolific or aggressive it may become.