Senate Candidate Ken Buck's Rape-Case Refusal Fuels Democratic Attacks

This isn't a great story for GOP Senate candidate Ken Buck: a woman alleging she was raped recorded a phone call in 2005 in which Buck, as district attorney, refused to take her case, suggesting that the jury might view her allegations as a case of "buyer's remorse."

The Colorado Independent reported the story Monday morning, having obtained audio (later posted at The Huffington Post) from the woman:

The alleged rape victim is back and determined to be heard. She told her story to the Colorado Independent and provided the tape of their meeting (click here for a pdf of the transcript), in which Buck appears to all but blame her for the rape and tells her that her case would never fly with a Weld County jury.

While the campaign has said this is a non-story, and while Buck's refusal to take the case was known before he ran for Senate--it happened in 2005, and the woman organized protests at the time--it fits within an attack narrative on Buck that Democrats have worked to build: that he is bad on women's issues.

Incumbent Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet [full disclosure: Bennet is the brother of Atlantic editor James Bennet] has aired ads attacking Buck for his abortion stance. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee has attacked him on abortion as well. And during his primary against Lt. Gov. Jane Norton, Buck faced criticism over a comment that Colorado Republicans should support him "because I do not wear high heels."

So while it's not the newest of news, its resurfacing fuels what Democrats are already saying about Buck as a candidate.