New York Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver is asking a Brooklyn assemblyman to quit over sexual harassment accusations that embroiled the powerful speaker.
Silver says he had asked Brooklyn Assemblyman Vito Lopez to quit after an Assembly ethics committee found he sexually harassed two women staffers. Silver is at the Democratic National Convention this week.
Silver is catching heat for separate sexual harassment charges made against Lopez months earlier. Silver said he was following the privacy wishes of the accusers when he agreed to a private settlement using $103,000 in public money.
Lopez says he didn't sexually harass anyone.
Silver is maintaining a high-level role in the national Democratic convention despite the scandal.
Staten Island District Attorney Dan Donovan is investigating.
The Joint Commission on Public Ethics is expected to investigate beginning today.
Copyright 2012 by The Associated Press