Lobbyist Pamela Lopez was at a party in 2016 in a Sacramento bar. She was meeting with a current California legislator in hopes that the connection would pay off later.
After greeting the legislator, who she still has not named, he forced Lopez into the bathroom.
She firmly told him:
"No, I'm not going to touch you."
He pleaded that she could at least touch another part of his body while he masturbated. She still refused and after he finished, he told her that they should return to the party.
Lopez recalls:
"He said, 'OK, don't tell anybody this happened.' I felt like he'd done this before; he wasn't shy."
Daniel Alvarez, secretary of the state Senate, calls Lopez's claims "startling and unsettling:"
"We take the allegation very seriously, and we are currently reviewing the matter."
Lopez continues to see the man who she says assaulted her, and says his lack of apology is "dehumanizing:"
"They know they can get away with it and they don't owe you the slightest apology. It's a challenge many women in politics have to deal with."