The woman, Meredith Watson, accused Fairfax of raping her while they were students at Duke University in 2000, saying in a statement that his actions were “premeditated and aggressive” and demanding that he resign immediately. Watson spoke out two days after Vanessa Tyson, a political science professor from California, said she was assaulted by Fairfax in 2004 during the Democratic National Convention in Boston.
By Friday evening, Fairfax was facing a wave of calls for his resignation. Democrats in the Virginia House and Senate urged him to step down, saying he “could no longer fulfill his duties to the commonwealth.” Patrick Hope, a Democrat in the Virginia House, said he would introduce articles of impeachment against Fairfax on Monday if the lieutenant governor had not resigned by then.
Fairfax, in a statement issued Friday evening, denied all of the allegations and called the latest one “demonstrably false.” He vowed he would not resign.
“I demand a full investigation into these unsubstantiated and false allegations,” Fairfax said. “Such an investigation will confirm my account because I am telling the truth.”
After days of intense pressure on the state’s Democratic governor and attorney general over past incidents when they wore blackface, the spotlight has swung quickly to Fairfax, who only days ago had been preparing for the possibility of becoming the state’s second African-American governor if Gov. Ralph Northam bowed to calls to resign.
Now Fairfax is facing those demands himself: After Watson’s allegation became public Friday, three prominent Democrats — former Gov. Terry McAuliffe of Virginia and Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, both 2020 presidential candidates — said Fairfax should step down.
“The allegations against Justin Fairfax are serious and credible,” McAuliffe said. “It is clear to me that he can no longer effectively serve the people of Virginia as lieutenant governor.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.