{"id":314253,"date":"2026-08-05T12:08:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T12:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/314253\/"},"modified":"2026-08-05T12:08:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T12:08:11","slug":"gop-rep-chuck-edwards-drops-re-election-bid-after-scathing-house-ethics-report-finds-inappropriate-conduct","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/314253\/","title":{"rendered":"GOP Rep. Chuck Edwards drops re-election bid after scathing House ethics report finds ‘inappropriate conduct’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-NC) announced early Wednesday that he was ending his bid for a third House term, two days after the House Ethics Committee recommended he be censured by his colleagues<\/a> for \u201cunprofessional and inappropriate conduct\u201d toward two female staffers.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter much prayer and reflection, I\u2019ve decided to withdraw from my re-election campaign,\u201d Edwards wrote in a statement posted on X at 3:30 a.m<\/a>. \u201cI will complete my current term. Serving Western North Carolina has been the honor of my life. Thank you for your trust, prayers, and support. God bless WNC and America.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ChuckChuck Edwards speaks to the press in Flat Rock, North Carolina, after his primary win on May 17, 2022. USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect<\/p>\n

Edwards, a 65-year-old married father and grandfather, \u201cwent beyond norms of professional behavior by giving both women lavish gifts,\u201d \u201ccommenting on the two women\u2019s appearance,\u201d and \u201cinviting them to intimate dinners and vacations,\u201d according to the 20-page report released Monday<\/a>. <\/p>\n

At the time, both aides were in their early 20s.<\/p>\n

On one occasion, the lawmaker arranged for a professional singer to attend a birthday party for one of the women and perform Ed Sheeran\u2019s song \u201cHills of Aberfeldy\u201d \u2014 and tell her only it was a gift \u201cfrom a special someone,\u201d the report stated.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Committee received evidence that [the staffer] told a friend this led her to believe that the Congressman did not view her as \u2018just a daughter figure\u2019 and that she was \u2018scared lowkey.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Edwards also paid for the same staffer and a friend to take a trip to New York City<\/a>, \u201cincluding tickets to \u2018Hamilton,\u2019 after she had gone through a breakup,\u201d the bipartisan committee found.<\/p>\n

\"Rep.Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-NC) announced early Wednesday that he was ending his bid for a third House term, two days after the House Ethics Committee recommended he be censured by his colleagues for \u201cunprofessional and inappropriate conduct\u201d toward two female staffers. US Congress<\/p>\n

Other gifts heaped on the women by the congressman included \u201cjewelry totaling over $1,000, designer purses, guns, shoes, flowers, a laptop and cell phone, KitchenAid mixer, robotic vacuum, vacations, tickets to performances, and one-on-one dinners.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cStaffer 1 said she did not feel obligated to wear the purse or jewelry Representative Edwards gave her, but Staffer 2 felt \u2018obligated to wear\u2019 a necklace he bought her and when she stopped wearing it, \u2018he made a comment about . . . how disappointed he is that I\u2019m not willing to wear what he got me,’\u201d according to the report.<\/p>\n

Edwards also discussed \u201cgoing to strip clubs in Washington\u201d with one of the women \u201cand other staffers\u201d, sent \u201cpersonal texts late in the evenings,\u201d and wrote the female staffer for whom he arranged the birthday performance and NYC trip a poem \u201cthat he read at her going away party in the congressional office accompanied by a slideshow, during which he cried.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the last occasion, the committee recorded that \u201d [s]everal staffers present testified that they felt uncomfortable, and Representative Edwards acknowledged in his own testimony that he could tell the staff felt uncomfortable.\u201d<\/p>\n

After another outing with the same woman, the committee found, Edwards printed out a text message exchange in which she thanked the congressman for the \u201cfun night,\u201d next to which he \u201cdrew a heart\u201d and hand-wrote \u201cPerhaps my proudest personal moment!\u201d<\/p>\n

In November 2025, Edwards met the now-former staffer in Las Vegas for a weekend that was abbreviated by the congressman being called back to DC to vote on ending the government shutdown<\/a>. <\/p>\n

When interviewed by investigators, the woman \u201ctestified that she ultimately felt pressured to go in part because of his persistence and in part because Representative Edwards continued to have influence over her career in another public service role.\u201d<\/p>\n

Edwards, in the report, was quoted as having \u201cdenied that any of his conduct was intended as a sexual or romantic advance, [but] his pattern of behavior would lead a reasonable observer to interpret it as such.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other staffers claimed that Edwards \u201cgave these women preferential treatment, which negatively impacted morale in the office,\u201d while ethics investigators determined that the congressman \u201cintentionally delet[ed] messages to these women that were particularly inappropriate\u201d and provided other texts to the committee \u201cin such a way to create the appearance that the women were initiating contact, he was not responding, or they were expressing greater interest in conversing with him than he was with them.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cWhile it is accurate that both Staffer 1 and Staffer 2 sent messages expressing gratitude and an interest in spending time with Representative Edwards outside of the office, their relationships with Representative Edwards evolved over time into something that made them uncomfortable but that they did not know how to handle,\u201d the report concluded.<\/p>\n

Edwards has represented North Carolina\u2019s Republican-leaning 11th District since 2023, after unseating controversial right-wing Rep. Madison Cawthorn<\/a> in a primary the previous year.<\/p>\n

In March, Edwards cruised to renomination, defeating challenger Adam Smith by 40 percentage points. But Democrats had expressed optimism about flipping the seat even before Edwards\u2019 ethics controversy, with nominee Jamie Ager significantly outraising the incumbent. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-NC) announced early Wednesday that he was ending his bid for a third House term,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":314254,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[416,10917,46937,9,11,10,1064,87,2134,7316,58],"class_list":["post-314253","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-elections","tag-ethics","tag-midterm-elections-2026","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-north-carolina","tag-politics","tag-republicans","tag-us-house-of-representatives","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314253","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=314253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314253\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/314254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=314253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=314253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=314253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}