Representative Eric Massa (D-NY) announced last week that he will resign from his post amid an Ethics Committee inquiry into inappropriate remarks that he made to a male staffer during a wedding reception at the end of December.
Massa had previously announced that he would not run for reelection in November due to a recurrence of cancer, but will now leave Washington this week due to the ongoing investigation.
Meanwhile, the New York representative said over the weekend that the Democratic "forces that be" have pushed him out of the House of Representatives to prevent him from voting against healthcare reform.
"Mine is now the deciding vote…and this administration has said they will stop at nothing to pass this healthcare bill, and now they’ve gotten rid of me and it will pass," said Massa, who was one of the 39 Democrats to vote against the House version of the healthcare bill in November. "You connect the dots."
Massa did acknowledge that he made an "inappropriate" remark to a male staffer at a New Years Eve wedding ceremony, but that the employee "never said to me that he felt uncomfortable," and that the harassment charges were filed by another staffer, according to CBS News. 