Herman Cain accuser got $45,000 settlement

By JONATHAN MARTIN | 11/3/11 1:25 PM EDT

POLITICO has learned that one of the women who accused Herman Cain of sexual harassment at the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s received a payout of about $45,000 as part of her settlement — significantly more than the two or three months’ salary Cain initially recalled the woman obtained.

The woman who received the approximately $45,000 is the staffer who Cain has acknowledged formally lodged a complaint about his behavior.
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Cain described her in a Fox News interview as a writer in the communications department.

The compensation the woman received as part of her departure package was far more than that what a midlevel trade association employee in the late 1990s would have made over a two-to-three month period.

It was also more than the payout a second association employee received after complaining about Cain’s behavior. According to The New York Times, the second woman received $35,000 — a year’s pay.

Cain’s changing stories about whether settlements existed, and their amounts, have muddled his explanations. He has not acknowledged that there is more than one settlement.

On Monday morning, Cain told Fox News, “If the restaurant [association] did a settlement, I was unaware of it.â€