Josh Shapiro’s administration quietly settled a sexual harassment claim against a top aide for $295k

HARRISBURG — Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration agreed to pay $295,000 to settle a sexual harassment complaint made against one of his most trusted senior aides, according to legal documents released Friday.

Mike Vereb — Shapiro’s top liaison to the General Assembly and one of the governor’s closest allies for decades — abruptly resigned his cabinet-level post last month after less than nine months on the job. The Inquirer later reported that Vereb had been accused in March of sexually harassing an employee who briefly worked for him in the governor’s office.

Vereb’s decision to step down came three weeks after Shapiro’s office agreed to pay his accuser to resolve complaints she’d filed with the state Office of Equal Employment Opportunity and the independent Human Relations Commission, according to the settlement documents signed Sept. 5 and released Friday through the state’s open records law.

The agreement did not include any admission of wrongdoing from Vereb or the governor’s office. And the woman — whom The Inquirer is not identifying due to the nature of the allegations — and others involved from both sides signed a nondisclosure agreement barring them from publicly discussing her allegations.

The complaint against Vereb and questions about a possible settlement deal had circulated around the Capitol for months before his departure and become a particularly fraught issue for Shapiro, who has cast himself as a champion for sexual abuse survivors both in his time investigating the Catholic Church as attorney general and on the campaign trail as he ran for governor last year.

A Shapiro spokesperson said in a statement that the terms of the settlement prevented the administration from commenting further on the case.

“Complainants and defendants often settle litigation for reasons not related to the validity of the underlying facts and claims,” Shapiro’s spokesperson, Manuel Bonder, said in a statement Friday. “Cases frequently settle solely so that parties can avoid the tremendous expense of litigation, including the time, resources, and costs to litigate a case for a protracted period.”

The governor defended the administration’s handling of the matter during an Oct. 5 news conference, saying the investigation of the woman’s claims had been “rigorous,” “confidential” and “grounded in integrity” though he declined to discuss specifics of the case.

Neither Vereb nor his accuser immediately responded to requests for comment Friday. The accuser’s attorney declined to comment.

NDAs like the one signed by Vereb and his accuser are an often routine part of out-of-court settlements. But they have drawn increased criticism in recent years — especially in sexual misconduct cases — from advocates for abuse survivors, who say such clauses allow abusers to buy the silence of those they’ve wronged and avoid public scrutiny for their misdeeds. Some states have moved to ban them from legal settlements involving public agencies or taxpayer money.

A spokesperson for the state Treasury, which pays all of the state’s bills, said it appeared Friday that the settlement, at least part of which will be paid covered with taxpayer dollars, has not yet been paid. The deal calls for roughly $45,000 to be paid by the Governor’s Office, while the state’s employee liability insurance program, which has a $250,000 maximum will cover the rest.

The accuser will not receive the full $295,000 settlement. The state agreed to pay her $196,365. The remainder will go toward her legal fees, with her attorneys getting $98,364.

According to documents she filed with state investigators earlier this year, Vereb’s accuser said he had repeatedly made sexual advances toward her and lewd remarks about other staffers and a female state senator.

The woman alleged that when she reported his behavior to higher-ups in Shapiro’s office, Vereb retaliated against her, prompting her decision to resign from the Office of Legislative Affairs in March, less than two months after she was hired.

Despite the NDA included in her settlement with the Shapiro administration, a statement in which she detailed those accusations for state investigators began circulating around Capitol by mid-September. An internal review found no evidence that these documents were leaked by a member of Shapiro’s administration, a spokesperson for the governor said. The Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission declined to comment.

Republicans — led by state Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward, of Westmoreland County — and some Democrats have questioned the timing of Vereb’s resignation, noting that he continued to serve a prominent role in the administration for months after the woman’s complaint was filed and even as the settlement talks were in the works.

Flight records show he flew to Indiana, Pa., with Shapiro in mid-August amid a standoff in negotiations over the budget proposal.

And last month, Vereb, a former police officer, also served in a frontline role as a liaison between the governor’s office and the Pennsylvania State Police during the two-week manhunt for escaped fugitive Danilo Cavalcante in Chester County. The settlement was signed during Cavalcante’s time on the run.

Responding to the release of the settlement terms Friday, state Rep. Abby Major (R., Armstrong) — who has served as a confidant to Vereb’s accuser since filing her complaint — questioned whether the deal had protected the woman with the “robust procedure” the governor’s office had promised in earlier public statements.

“Apparently, the governor’s ‘robust procedure’ is a robust settlement and a robust NDA,” said Major, who has ben open about her own alleged experiences with sexual harassment.

As for the promised payout to Vereb’s accuser, Major said: “Good for her.”