House members on Tuesday censured Rep. Chuck Edwards for sexual harassment of two former staffers, even as he insisted that poetry he wrote and gifts he gave were not intended to be romantic. 

They voted overwhelmingly, 413-2, to censure Edwards and adopt a report from the Ethics Committee detailing “persistent unprofessional and inappropriate conduct.” 

Speaking on the House floor, Edwards defended himself, saying he was sorry he put the women in an “uncomfortable position” but adding “regret is not an admission.”

“I am imperfect. I have made mistakes, but I do not believe I committed sexual harassment,” the North Carolina Republican said.

His pleas did not work as he had hoped. In the end, just one of his colleagues, Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., joined him in voting against the rebuke.  

Some complained the punishment doesn’t go far enough given the findings of the ethics probe, which surfaced deeply personal text messages to the women, along with gifts like jewelry, guns, shoes, a KitchenAid mixer, a robotic vacuum and one-on-one dinners. 

“We all know what a censure is. You stand on the floor of the House, and we read the resolution to you, and then it’s over. … He engaged in two years of sexual harassment, and he’s going to have to be embarrassed for two minutes on the floor,” said Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández, D-N.M., chair of the Democratic Women’s Caucus.

It comes as the House faces a larger reckoning over lawmakers’ behavior toward staff and after two members — Reps. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., and Tony Gonzales, R-Texas — resigned earlier this year over sexual misconduct allegations.

Edwards waived his right to a public “trial” in front of the Ethics Committee, allowing it to more quickly recommend a punishment for the full House to consider. But he also mounted an unusual pressure campaign in the days leading up to the censure vote, circulating a 22-page letter among his Republican colleagues.

“It was clearly the ranting of a man who had no grasp of the reality of what he had done,” Leger Fernández said. 

“I don’t need a letter to convince me of what I’ve already decided on,” said Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., who led a separate effort to expel Gonzales before the embattled Texas Republican resigned.

“If I were him, I would,” Luna said, when asked if Edwards should resign. 

Last month, Edwards dropped his bid for reelection “after much prayer and reflection” but said he would finish serving out his term. 

Censure in the House is a type of formal rebuke that, unlike expulsion, carries no actual penalty. It requires just a simple majority of members to vote in favor, rather than two-thirds. While censures have been historically rare, they have become more common over the last several years, with some members seeking to use them as a way to score political points. 

Last year, Al Green was censured after an outburst at the State of the Union. And in 2023, Reps. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich. and Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., were all censured. Schiff is now a senator; Bowman is no longer in the House.

The Ethics Committee cannot impose a punishment on a member by itself, but can recommend one for the full House to take up — which it did in its report about Edwards. 

According to House Ethics Chair Michael Guest, the concern with Edwards was not quid pro quo harassment, where a boss demands sexual acts in exchange for professional perks, but rather creating a “hostile work environment.” 

Edwards sat stone-faced and alone on Tuesday while Guest, R-Miss., and ranking member Mark DeSaulnier, D-Calif., defended their committee’s report on the House floor.

“For sexual harassment to truly have no place in the congressional workplace, the principle cannot exist only on paper in a committee report. It must be modeled for accountability,” DeSaulnier said. 

When it was his turn to speak, Edwards gave his own version of events. 

“Generosity is not sexual harassment. Caring deeply about the people with whom you’ve worked for years is not sexual harassment. And conduct that is otherwise permissible does not automatically become misconduct simply because enough individual moments are assembled together, and viewed through the darkest possible lens,” he said. 

Republican leaders had largely tried to avoid the issue, saying they wanted to let the process play out. But on Tuesday, Speaker Mike Johnson cast his own vote in favor of censuring Edwards.

In a statement last week, GOP Women’s Caucus Chair Kat Cammack, R-Fla., said Edwards was entitled to challenge the findings but had not gone far enough in expressing remorse and “grappling with why the pattern of conduct raised serious concerns in the first place.” 

A bipartisan group of lawmakers from both women’s caucuses — led by Cammack and Leger Fernández — has been working on a list of recommendations to overhaul how the House deals with sexual misconduct that is expected to be unveiled this month. 

“It’s time we reform the rules in Congress so abusers like Edwards are at least stripped of committee assignments or expelled if the offense calls for it, after an investigation and after a vote … because serving in Congress is a privilege and not an honor. It is not a right,” Leger Fernández said on the floor.