Former New Jersey
governor James McGreevey says it was an affair with
another man that wrecked his marriage and ended his
political career. But the former aide implicated in
the affair, Golan Cipel, an Israeli, denies the
stories recounted in McGreevey's new tell-all book, saying
there was never consensual sex and that there were
several occasions where he felt sexually harassed,
according to newspaper reports.
"I didn't have sex with him ever," Cipel, 37,
told The Philadelphia Inquirer. "In his book he
talks about love, but I never heard anything from McGreevey
that was affectionate. The only thing I experienced
from him was sexual harassment."
Speaking by phone from Israel where he works,
Cipel told the paper that he needed to counter
what he described as lies in McGreevey's book, The
Confession, which is due in bookstores on Tuesday.
Cipel repeatedly has denied that he is gay.
McGreevey stood by his account of the
relationship as described in the book. "The book is
rigorously, if not painfully, honest," McGreevey told
the Associated Press on Sunday. "It was necessary in
my recovery to be totally honest--to embrace my
mistakes, my failures, and the pain I
caused--and to take responsibility for my actions. The
book is an effort, however imperfect, to describe the
dangers of living a divided, inauthentic life."
A copy of the book, obtained Thursday by the
Associated Press, has McGreevey recounting how he
first bedded Cipel in December 2001 while his wife was
in the hospital after delivering their daughter. McGreevey
describes kissing Cipel as the first kiss in his life
that meant something and calls their
lovemaking "a boastful, passionate, whispering,
masculine kind of love."
Cipel said the evening instead involved
McGreevey taking him out to a bar, then back to his
condo for shots of Jagermeister. McGreevey pushed him
to drink more and then told him to go upstairs to look at
something "for work," Cipel said.
"So McGreevey comes up, turned toward the den
very fast, and pushed me toward the bedroom. I froze,
and I said, 'What's going on?' He pushed me again on
my chest. He jumped on me and we wrestled. He tried to kiss
me. He tried to sexually assault me," Cipel said.
Cipel said he asked McGreevey why he would think
he was gay. "And McGreevey said, 'Everybody is a
little gay.' I was completely in shock," Cipel told
the newspaper.
According to Cipel, he broke free. But he said
he was scared because there was a state trooper
outside. "If I hit the governor back, who would they
blame? I rushed out. I went home. I couldn't sleep all
night. Thoughts in my mind were running. What am I
going to do?" Cipel said.
New Jersey state senator Ray Lesniak, a longtime
McGreevey friend, told the Inquirer that Cipel
is an "extortionist and opportunist" and a "liar and a
coward." "He's proven it his entire history here in
the United States over and over again. And he
continues to lie and he continues to hide and run away
from the truth," Lesniak said.
Allen Lowy, a lawyer who handled Cipel's sexual
harassment case, did not immediately return messages
left Sunday night seeking comment about Cipel's
remarks. In a separate interview with the New York Daily
News, Cipel addressed McGreevey's claims that
blackmail threats led to his August 2004 resignation announcement.
Cipel said FBI investigators came to Israel and
concluded he did not try to blackmail McGreevey. "I
was just the only one with the courage to speak out,"
Cipel said.
Through lawyers, Cipel threatened to sue
McGreevey for sexual harassment shortly before and
after McGreevey's resignation. A lawsuit was never
filed, and the statute of limitations lapsed. "I wanted to
get on with my life," Cipel told the News.
After the resignation, McGreevey, 49, retreated
into private life and remained silent until he spoke
with Oprah Winfrey about the book for a show will air
this Tuesday. He works now as a university-level
educational consultant and a childhood antipoverty advocate
and lives in Plainfield, N.J., with his partner, Mark O'Donnell.
According to Cipel, he enjoyed working on
McGreevey's 2001 gubernatorial run but assumed he
would not be on McGreevey's staff because he was a
non-U.S. citizen. "He said, 'I can arrange anything. I'm the
most powerful governor in the nation,'" Cipel told
The Inquirer.
Cipel was later named by the governor to head
the state's homeland security department in charge of
counterterrorism efforts despite having no experience.
Cipel told the Daily News that he once asked
McGreevey to whom he should report. "And he said, 'Only
God is above me,'" Cipel said. (AP)
