There has been a lot of questions about the representation of Gloria Allred of Nicky Diaz Santillan, the former maid of Meg Whitman. I agree the whole thing looks bad. I mean this woman is a mother of two children who is risking prison (for falsifying documents) and deportation (for being an illegal alien) by putting a giant target on her head. Certainly from a financial perspective this makes just about no sense. But I have argued with others that you can’t really file ethics charges against Allred because she has a ready defense. She can say that the maid was so mad at Whitman and so wanted to ruin her political career she didn’t care about those potential negative consequences she would personally suffer. Its dubious but just plausible enough that I don’t think the disciplinary board would even be interested in investigating her.
But you still have to wonder how much Allred truly pushed her in this direction. So Allred being asked about this several times apparently felt it was time for her client to respond to the cliam that Allred or others are manipulating her. And the result is unintentional hilarity:
Nicky Diaz Santillan, a Mexican who Whitman says used a fraudulently obtained Social Security card and California driver’s license, dismissed claims by the GOP nominee that she was part of a Democratic smear intended to damage Whitman’s standing with voters, particularly Latinos.
“I make my own decisions and I am not anyone’s puppet,” Diaz Santillan said in a prepared statement she read at the Los Angeles office of her attorney, Gloria Allred. “Nobody made me do it.”
(emphasis added). I don’t know if the AP writer was intentionally snarking or what. I mean the AP article goes on to mention a few other harsh facts. But yeah, that doesn’t exactly help the case to read a prepared statement that you are not being controlled by anyone. It’s reminiscent of that classic scene in Monty Python and the Life of Brian when the crowd says, in unison, “we are all individuals.” And yeah, I will post a link to a video of that later.
That being said I have come to think that Whitman should absolutely sue Allred. Someone needs to hold this woman accountable for her antics. And I think the malice standard for defamation—necessary in this kind of case—is easily met. As Greta said the other day, her reading of the facts borders on delusional.
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