In a late morning news conference at celebrity attorney Gloria Allred’s office, a former housekeeper has revealed charges that have exploded the California’s governor’s race in controversy. Republican candidate Meg Whitman’s former housekeeper, Nicky Diaz-Santillan, alleges her employer of nine years mistreated and overworked her and claims she knew she was an illegal alien from Mexico.
The press conference was carried by Hollywood gossip site TMZ who often works with the celebrity attorney.
Not surprisingly the Meg Whitman camp sees things a lot differently.
Whitman said in a statement, "After nine years of employment Nicky confessed that she 'was an illegal worker.' Nicky has falsified the hiring documents and personal information she provided to the employment agency that brought her to us in 2000."
Whitman contends that Diaz-Santillan "is being manipulated by Gloria Allred for political and financial purposes during the last few weeks of a hotly-contested election."
Allred did admit that she was supporting Democrat Jerry Brown in the governor’s race and this case has nothing to do with politics. “When people revert to name calling, as Whitman has, I know I have won the argument.”
However, Whitman spokesman Rob Stutzman said before the press conference that Diaz-Santillan "falsified her employment records" and Diaz-Santillan is being "manipulated by Ms. Allred,” according to The Los Angeles Times.
But Allred believes, "that Ms. Whitman was aware of her status, and may have understood that she was vulnerable because of it," She also implied Whitman was playing a game of "don't ask, don't tell" to "exploit her while pretending that she didn't know the truth about her status."
Details disclosed at the press conference include; the housekeepers salary of $23-per hour, when she was hired she was expected to work 15-hours-per week, the housekeeper drove Whitman’s children to and from school, tended to the grocery shopping and was expected to perform light cleaning duties.
The housekeeper Diaz-Santillan claims she worked much more than 15-hours-per week and was never reimbursed for mileage or extra hours over her nine-year employment stint.
It appears when the housekeeper’s legal status came into contention, Diaz-Santillan claims that Whitman fired her after her husband said, “I knew she was going to cause problems for us.”
The actual firing came after a teary-eyed face to face meeting with Whitman in which Diaz-Santillan came clean about her legal status and told the gubernatorial candidate she was from Mexico and had no legal papers to be in this country.
“I ask Ms. Whitman if she would help me get an immigration lawyer so I could stay in America. She said she would call her lawyer and call me soon,” Diaz-Santillan said at the press conference. A few days later when Diaz-Santillan called her employer, Whitman said she couldn’t help her and told Diaz-Santillan that “you don’t know me do you understand?”
Allred described Whitman’s treatment of Diaz-Santillan as "cold and heartless treatment of a hardworking Latina."
The comments from Whitman’s camp will be released later today, but the candidate claims the charges are false and they have documents to prove their case.
For more stories; http://www.examiner.com/county-political-buzz-in-san-diego/kimberly-dvorak
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment