Accuser Karen Monahan: Keith Ellison Asked Me to Stop Hinting at Alleged Abuse

Rep. Keith Ellison's ex-girlfriend, Karen Monahan, who has accused the DNC co-chairman of
CBS News / U.S. Congress

Karen Monahan, a Minneapolis political activist, claims her ex-boyfriend Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) reached out to her during the #MeToo movement and said he did not “want to have to look over [his] shoulder” for the accusations of abuse she recently made public.

Even though the Democratic National Convention Chair is not worried, the accusations of domestic abuse are gaining attention. Monahan, a 44-year-old Iranian-American, spoke to CBS News, telling her story about the man who wants to be Minnesota’s next Attorney General.

“He met with me at a coffee shop closer to my place that evening, before he ran for [Attorney General],” Monahan remembered. “The conversation went straight to ‘Hey, you know, I noticed that you’ve been tweeting a lot, you know, about abuse and the #MeToo, and over months talking about your own [personal experience].”

Monahan said that Ellison then questioned her: “Are you going to keep tweeting about this? I don’t want to have to look over my shoulder all the time, wondering when you’re going to tweet something, and say it’s me.”

However, Monahan said, she was ready for him:

At this point in time, I’m grounded, and I know who I am. I have healed for a year and a half. I looked straight at him, I said ‘I never ruined your career. I didn’t choose to do the things you did. I didn’t choose for you to drag me off the bed, call me a bitch, tell me you hate me. I didn’t choose that.

The alleged incident she is referring to occurred in 2016, according to Monahan. She says that Ellison blew up at her for not immediately responding to a request to take out the garbage.

“He looked at me, goes, ‘Hey you f***ing hear me… and then he looked at me, he goes ‘Bitch, get the f*** out of my house,’ and he started to try to drag me off the bed,” Monahan said.

Ellison denied the allegations in a video interview with a local CBS affiliate. When asked if there is a video of the alleged incident, he insisted, “There couldn’t be such a thing as that… because I never did that.”

Monahan has said she still has a copy of the video but wants to avoid the trauma of releasing it for public viewing. She says her accusations, even without the video evidence, should be enough for people to believe her.

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