Report: Herman Cain Accuser Received $45,000

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One of the two women who filed sexual harassment complaints against Herman Cain received $45,000 from the National Restaurant Association over her claim, according to a Politico report.

This is separate from a $35,000 settlement — one year’s pay — that the New York Times reported was handed out to a different woman whose complaint Cain has not publicly acknowledged exists.

Cain told FOX News on Monday that the woman who reportedly received $45,000 had made between $40,000-50,000 a year and had been given only a small settlement, suggesting that it may not have even been too different from a standard severance agreement.

“She ended up getting what she would have gotten if she had just said, I want to leave and I would like to negotiate a severance agreement,” he said at the time. “That’s probably as far as we would have gone. But I can’t guarantee that it was two months or three months. I just know it was well within the range of what we would do if we had an amicable separation between the association and an employee.”

Cain later revised his estimate upwards to “three to six months” on CNN Headline News.

According to a sexual harassment attorney in DC, Debra Katz, however, the two reported payouts sound more significant than Cain lets on.

“The amounts that get achieved in cases are — unfortunately — dependent on the income level of the person asserting the claims,” she said. “So for someone who earns $35,000 a year it’s significant.”

She added that in situations where the employee feels compelled to leave, settlements often have to factor in how long it would take them to land back at their feet elsewhere.

“A year’s funding at a time when there was a robust economy and you were dealing with a low-level position,” she said. “That’s a very good settlement.”

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