Lawyer: Cain not telling truth over sexual harassment claims

A lawyer for one of the two women who made complaints of sexual harassment against Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain has claimed he is not telling the truth about the allegations.

1. Other political news of note
   1. Capping week of scandal management, Obama says focus remains on jobs

      First Read: It hasn’t been a fun week in the West Wing, but President Barack Obama insisted Friday that his focus remains on job creation despite Washington’s tendency to get “distracted”  by political battles.

   2. 2016 notebook: Republicans try to dent Clinton's armor?
   3. Issa issues subpoena to Benghazi review board leader
   4. IRS officials testify at House hearing
   5. Michelle Obama urges grads to be 'an example of excellence'

The attorney, Joel P. Bennett, told CNN's Anderson Cooper 360 that his client was "very upset" and was considering talking publicly about the case if she was released from a confidentiality clause.

The National Restaurant Association made financial severance agreements with two women while Cain was the organization's CEO from 1996 to 1999. The New York Times reported late Tuesday that one woman was given $35,000, a year's salary, citing three people with direct knowledge of the payment.

Toon-Off: Cain controversy

Asked if his client believed Cain was not telling the truth, Bennett told CNN: "Yes."

"Naturally, she's been very upset about all this since the story broke last Sunday, because Mr. Cain has been giving the impression that she's someone who came out and made false allegations. That's certainly not true," Bennett told the station.

"What I have heard him say on the media is that he never sexually harassed anyone and that there was no validity to these claims ... my client made a good faith, honest complaint of sexual harassment," he added.

"I know her very well and I'm sure she would not make a false complaint," Bennett said.

The lawyer noted that it was unclear which of the two women Cain was talking about at times.

Conflicting statements
Cain has given a series of conflicting statements in the two days since the accusations were disclosed on the website Politico.

On Monday he said he was unaware of a financial settlement given a female employee in connection with allegations Cain had engaged in inappropriate sexual behavior. He later acknowledged he was aware of an "agreement" but not a settlement.

He said Tuesday that the two statements were consistent with each other.

"It was an agreement. So it looked like I had changed my story. I didn't change my story," Cain told CNN's Headline News. "The difference between settlement and agreement, it makes a difference to me."

Cain has said the unnamed woman initially asked for a large financial settlement but ultimately received two to three months' pay as part of a separation agreement.

He also acknowledged remembering one woman's accusations against him, saying he stepped close to her to make a reference to her height, and told her she was the same height as his wife.

He has said he is not aware of any other agreements or settlements with any other women, though Politico — which first disclosed the allegations Sunday night — reported that the restaurant trade group had given financial settlements to at least two female employees who accused Cain of inappropriate sexual behavior.

Surging atop the polls only two months before Republicans begin choosing their presidential nominee, the former Godfather's Pizza CEO had scheduled a tour of Washington this week to introduce himself to the nation's power brokers and show he is ready for high office.

Key meetings for Cain
Cain was planning a series of meetings Wednesday in which he will discuss health care reform and likely his own political viability with Republican lawmakers who could help salvage it from the fallout of the sexual harassment allegations.

The extent to which the harassment allegations could harm Cain's campaign remains unclear.

Cain said that rather than the allegations hurting, his fundraising was actually surging — "the highest it has been since I've been in this campaign," he told Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly.

The campaign took in as much as $400,000 in a single day, said Mark Block, Cain's chief of staff.

Some conservatives likened the attacks on the Republican presidential contender to the sexual harassment controversy that once threatened to prevent the Senate confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who like Cain is among a small number of prominent black conservatives.

But there is no evidence of liberal involvement in the disclosure of the sexual harassment allegations against Cain.

The revelations could end up benefiting his Republican opponents in the short term.

The accusations against Cain, an untested political newcomer, could give Republican primary voters pause at a time when they desperately want a candidate who can defeat Obama.

Cain said Tuesday night on Fox News that he believes there are some Democrats who want him defeated because he's an unconventional candidate "achieving some unexpected, unconventional results," and there could be some on the right "who do not want to see me because I am not the establishment candidate."

'Be forthcoming'
One rival campaign criticized Cain for his handling of the allegations.

"If you are the front-runner and you plan to be the nominee ... be forthcoming so that you are vetted, and we don't get into a situation where you're our nominee and we find out things after the fact," John Brabender, a strategist for former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum's campaign, told a forum.

Another Republican presidential contender, Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, took a jab at Cain when she met Tuesday night with supporters at a Baptist church in Marshalltown, Iowa.

Though not mentioning Cain by name, Bachmann said: "This is the year when we can't have any surprises with our candidate. We have to have a candidate that we can know, when we put them into office, we can trust them with their record of what they have done and who they are."

At the beginning of her speech, Bachmann said that God is "calling" her to run for president, NBC News reported.

"It was an odd feeling for me, when I had the sense that the Lord was calling me to participate in this race," Bachmann told the audience.

She added: "It's not every day you can wake up in the morning, and say to yourself, 'I'm running to be president of the United States of America.'"

The remark won laughs, and Bachmann followed: "You try it. You go home, you look in the mirror and say it!"

Many opinion polls show Cain running about even with former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, who has business experience as a venture capitalist.

Several other candidates have risen and fallen in the race to emerge as the main conservative alternative to Romney, whose shifting positions on abortion and gay rights and Mormon faith have raised doubts among the party's key evangelical base.