A sex harassment lawsuit re-filed Thursday morning against State Treasurer Dan Rutherford names the Mitt Romney for President 2012 campaign, according to local reports.
The suit claims Rutherford, who worked as the Illinois chair for Romney's presidential campaign in 2012, made state employees work on the campaign. If employees didn't work the campaign, the suit alleges Rutherford would retaliate against them.
“The complaint alleges that Rutherford was a political boss who used mob tactics to force his employees to do his illegal political work on state time,” Attorney Dana Kurtz said in a statement. “According to the complaint, Rutherford even kept a “hit list” of state employees including the Plaintiff who he was going to fire because they did not do enough political work for him."
The amended lawsuit was filed by former Rutherford employee Ed Michalowski, who alleges Rutherford "coerced and intimidated" him into performing political work on behalf of the Rutherford campaign.
In the original suit he accused Rutherford of sexual harassment and claimed the treasurer asked him to perform campaign duties on state time.
Rutherford, a Republican candidate for Illinois governor when the suit was filed, suggested at the time the suit was politically motivated. Last week, a spokesman for the treasurer said he has no comment.
Additional counts of racketeering and political discrimination were added to the amended suit.
The suit also claims Rutherford only hired interns if they could be useful to his campaign.
