State Rep. Fabián Basabe was accused of multiple incidents of sexual harassment and battery, including once “in the back of a classroom full of elementary school children”
Credit: Jose A. Iglesias/Miami Herald/Tribune News Service via Getty
NEED TO KNOW
- A Florida jury has found that Republican state Rep. Fabián Basabe — who bills himself as a “common sense family man” — is liable for sexually harassing two of his male staffers
- A civil court jury ordered the scandal-plagued former reality TV personality to pay the staffers $450,000 in damages
- The aides alleged multiple incidents of sexual harassment and battery, including once “in the back of a classroom full of elementary school children”
A Florida jury has found that a Republican state lawmaker — who bills himself as a “common sense family man” — is liable for sexually harassing two of his male staffers, ordering the scandal-plagued former reality TV personality to pay the staffers $450,000 in damages.
But Miami state Rep. Fabián Basabe, who fired his lawyers and represented himself at trial, has so far declined to resign after the jury sided with the aides’ claims that he slapped, groped and attempted to kiss them.
“Should any of these allegations ever prove true against me at any point in the future, I would resign on the spot and be held accountable,” Basabe said in an October 2024 video addressed to his constituents. “This is how much faith I have in myself, my character and my integrity.”
Basabe’s campaign and statehouse office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from PEOPLE on Monday, July 20.
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Former legislative aide Nicolas Frevola and former intern Jacob Cutbirth accused Basabe, now 48, in the lawsuit of multiple incidents of sexual harassment and battery, including “slapping [Frevola] on his rear and whispering in his ear ‘I want all of that butt’ while they were standing in the back of a classroom full of elementary school children,” the former staffer’s attorney Cindy Myers told the news outlet Florida Politics.
Myers also said the jury concluded Basabe sexually harassed Cutbirth on numerous occasions, including by “asking him how big his genitals were, of encouraging him to break off his engagement with his wife to have sex with Mr. Basabe and other men for sport.”
“How this man got re-elected in Miami is beyond me, and it goes without saying that the voters in that district should seriously reconsider sending him back to office again when the next election is held later this year,” Myers added.
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Following the Tallahassee-area civil jury’s verdict and judgment last week after a three-year legal battle, Basabe told Florida Politics that “representing myself was a mistake” and insisted he was “innocent.”
“This is a difficult time for me and my family, but their confidence in who I am has not changed,” Basabe told the outlet on July 15. “Neither has my determination. For now, I have no further comment on this matter.”
“Representative Basabe’s behavior is disgusting, and I am disturbed that the Republican leadership in the House engaged in a cover-up to shield Representative Basabe from the consequences of his actions,” Florida Democrats’ chair Nikki Fried told The Advocate. “Representative Basabe has no business holding public office for another day, he must resign immediately.”
Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty
The Florida Commission on Ethics dismissed ethics complaints from Frevola in February and from Cutbirth in March after dismissing their initial complaints back in 2023, according to Florida Politics.
A 2023 investigation by an outside law firm brought in by the GOP-controlled Florida House leadership to investigate claims against Basabe also concluded there was “no evidence” of wrongdoing.
“Today, Mr. Basabe did not have his friends in the Florida House of Representatives helping him cover up the facts and the evidence,” Myers said on July 15. “This jury weighed my clients’ credibility against Mr. Basabe’s, and the jury believed them, not Mr. Basabe.”
Myers is also representing the former staffers in a lawsuit against the Florida House “for covering up what Mr. Basabe did to these two young men, who once believed in the dignity of that institution, and who had plans to continue to serve there in the future.”
Representatives for Florida House Speaker Daniel Perez — who is President Donald Trump’s nominee to be the next U.S. ambassador to Brazil — did not immediately respond to a request for comment from PEOPLE on Monday.
Credit: Shareif Ziyadat/Getty
Basabe, who was first elected in 2022, was a cast member on the mid-2000s show Filthy Rich: Cattle Drive. The E! reality show featured a group of privileged children, including Kourtney Kardashian and George Foreman III, working on a Colorado cattle ranch.
Though he has been married to a woman since 2005, Basabe has also publicly described himself as gay, according to The Advocate. He has drawn the ire of the LGBTQ+ community in Florida after campaigning on being socially liberal but supporting legislation backed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, including an expansion of the state’s so-called Don’t Say Gay bill.
Basabe is also close with actor Cuba Gooding Jr., who was initially on the witness list for Basabe’s trial, but ultimately did not testify, according to the Miami Herald. Gooding has been accused of groping dozens of women and pleaded guilty to one count of forcible touching in 2022.
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