“While I have no recollection of this incident, I am truly sorry for any thing I did that offended you, upset you or hurt your feelings,” Kennedy said in a text message to Cooney, sent at 12:33 a.m. on July 4, two days after her accusations were made public. “I never intended to harm you and if I hurt you it was inadvertently and I am sorry that I did.”
He added: “If that makes you feel safe, [sic] I would love to tell you over the phone, or preferably in person, but I understand that may not be possible. My purpose in sending this text is nothing other than to be sincere and honest with you. [sic] “We will compensate you.”
Reached by phone Thursday, Kennedy declined to comment on Cooney’s allegations or to elaborate on his message to Cooney.
“The text message speaks for itself,” he said.
The message, which Cooney provided to The Washington Post and which the paper confirmed was sent from Kennedy’s cellphone number, has never been previously reported and represents the candidate’s most detailed response to Cooney’s accusations.
Cooney said in an interview with The Post: Currently 48 years old, He expressed surprise that Kennedy claimed he had no recollection of the incident and said he believed his attempts to reach out were aimed at damage control rather than a genuine expression of remorse.
“It was disingenuous and arrogant,” Cooney said of his message. “I don’t understand how you can be sincere in apologizing for something you don’t remember. I didn’t sense any remorse.”
She said she also felt uneasy when Kennedy suggested they meet in person.
“‘Meet in person’? What woman wants that?” Cooney said.
Mr. Kennedy, the son of former Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, is expected to wield influence in this year’s tumultuous presidential election. An independent known for his conspiratorial worldview and anti-vaccination activism, Mr. Kennedy has attracted a relatively small but enthusiastic following among Americans who say they are disillusioned with how the major parties vote. Polls show that about 9% of voters nationwide support his candidacy.
Despite his well-known name, other prominent members of his family have disowned his campaign, fearing it could divert crucial votes from President Biden in a close election.
After Cooney’s article was published in Vanity Fair, Kennedy called her cell phone twice on July 3 and sent her a text message the same day. He asked her to call him, and just after midnight, he sent a second text message apologizing, according to screenshots from her phone.
Cooney said she hasn’t been in contact with Kennedy in years and doesn’t know how he got her phone number. She said she hasn’t responded to calls or messages from Kennedy.
Kennedy deflected when asked about the incident last week.
“I’m not a church boy,” he said on the Breaking Points podcast. “I had a very, very tumultuous youth. [campaign] “…I have so much to hide that if everyone could vote, I could run for king of the world,” he said in his inaugural address. Asked if he denied Cooney’s allegations, Kennedy said, “I’m not going to comment on that.”
Cooney said, She began working for Kennedy in the fall of 1998 after spending the summer babysitting his nieces and nephews on Cape Cod. A recent graduate from Pomona College, she was interested in a career in environmental law; Kennedy was then the top lawyer for Riverkeeper, one of New York’s leading environmental groups.
Cooney, who worked as an intern during the week at Pace Law School’s Environmental Litigation Clinic and looked after Kennedy’s children on weekends, said she lived in the spacious Mount Kisco, N.Y., home that Kennedy shared with his second wife, Mary Richardson Kennedy, who committed suicide more than a decade later during a bitter divorce proceeding from her husband.
A few weeks into the job, Cooney said she was sitting in her kitchen with Kennedy and a Riverkeeper volunteer when Kennedy began running his hands up and down her leg under the table. Cooney shook his hand away, but he held on for the rest of the conversation.
The couple never spoke about it again, but Cooney wrote about the experience in a diary that was shown to The Post.
“It seemed like he thought I was someone else or wasn’t paying attention,” she wrote. “He would sometimes regain consciousness, come to his senses, and then I’d drift away. It seemed like he was on some kind of medication, or very tired, or missing Mary, or testing me.”
Shortly thereafter, Kennedy showed up at her room one day shirtless with a large bottle of Kiehl’s, an expensive body lotion, and asked her to rub it on her back. Cooney’s wife explained that she believed it was the best moisturizer. Cooney said she was uncomfortable with the request but complied, after which he left.
The third time, she was searching the kitchen pantry for ingredients for lunch after a yoga class when Kennedy quietly approached her from behind and put his hands on her lower back, she said. He then allegedly put his hands on both sides of her body and breasts.
“I remember thinking, ‘Oh my God, what the hell is going on?'” Cooney told The Washington Post. “It looked a lot like someone hiding under a bed or something and just being quiet, you know? That’s what it felt like.”
At that moment, a man working on renovating the house came into the kitchen, announced himself to Kennedy, and told him, “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do” and “Don’t do anything you wouldn’t want your wife to do.” Things you need to know.”
Cooney never spoke to Kennedy about the incident afterward, but continued to live in the house for several months and worked for the Pace law firm for several more years, completing a project on the history of the Hudson River.
“I felt like if I quit, everything I’d invested in would go to waste,” she says. “It was my first job, and I didn’t want to fail. I wanted to work for Bobby Kennedy, who was a famous environmental lawyer at the time, and that was what I wanted to do.”
But Cooney said he ultimately decided against pursuing the job, in part because of his bad experience with Kennedy.
She first came forward to her mother, Holly Cooney, a few years ago, amid a wave of #MeToo revelations, and told The Washington Post that it was “terrifying to hear, especially from your own child.”
Last summer, Ms. Cooney consulted with Elizabeth Geddes, a former federal prosecutor now in private practice. Geddes said that while the unwanted touching of her breasts that Ms. Cooney described constituted sexual assault, the statute of limitations for criminal action had expired. Ms. Cooney was still eligible to file a civil lawsuit under New York’s Adult Survivors Act for a certain period of time, but she decided not to, fearing the cost and duration of litigation and the potential repercussions for her and her family.
Mr Geddes said this week that he thought it was highly unusual that Mr Kennedy had attempted to contact Mr Cooney directly.
“This may well make the perpetrator feel better about what he did,” Geddes said, “but it is unlikely that such an apology will provide any closure or comfort to someone who has been sexually assaulted in the workplace.”
Alice Crites contributed to this report.
