Statement by NOW President Toni Van Pelt:

Either Jim Jordan is lying—or the wrestlers he was paid to mentor and care for are.

The Ohio Congressman denies knowing about a team doctor groping student wrestlers when Jordan was the assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State University between 1986 and 1995. The university says that former athletes from 14 OSU sports have reported abuse. But when former OSU wrestlers came forward to say that they saw Jordan witness or acknowledge the doctor’s behavior, Rep. Jordan attacked the whistleblowers and denied everything.

“Conversations in the locker room are a lot different than people coming up and talking about abuse,” Jordan said. “No one ever reported any abuse to me.”

In other words, because no one had a conversation with him in which the phrase “I was abused” was uttered, no wrongdoing occurred. As the Cleveland Plain-Dealer said in an editorial,

“With all due respect to Jordan, there’s a slang word Ohioans use to describe such fine-line distinctions: ‘Weaseling.’ “

Jim Jordan wants to make a run to succeed Paul Ryan as Speaker, but his colleagues should know by now that they can’t trust a word he says. Do they even care?

We don’t believe Jim Jordan. If he didn’t know about the abuse going on under his watch he should have known. It was his job to protect his students, and he failed miserably.

Contact

Brittany T. Oliver, comms@now.org