Diaz said that she told Whitman she wanted her to help in getting an immigration attorney.
“Ms. Whitman just laughed and turn her face to one side. At that moment Dr. Harsh entered,” Diaz said. “Dr. Harsh was very angry and said, “I told you, I told you she was going to bring us problems!”
The Whitman camp said Diaz was suspended from employment that same day. Diaz said Whitman left a voicemail message on June 22 informing her that she had contacted her lawyer. Whitman’s camp said she informed Diaz that she had been terminated on or about June 29, 2009.
“She said ‘I cannot help you, and don’t say anything to my children. I will tell them you already have a new job’,” Whitman told Diaz, according to the former housekeeper’s account. “From now on you don’t know me, and I don’t know you. You have never seen me and I have never seen you’,” Diaz said Whitman told her.
There has been no further contact between Ms. Diaz and Meg Whitman since her termination, according to the Whitman camp.
Video from Allred’s GMA interview, Diaz’s press conference and audio from Whitman’s call with campaign reporters below.
Late Update: Whitman’s husband Griff Harsh wrote a note on the so-called “no match” letter sent by the Social Security Administration back in 2003, according to documents displayed at at press conference by a lawyer for the former housekeeper.
“Nicky, please check this. Thanks,” he wrote, according to the document displayed by Allred.
That contradicts what Whitman told the Associated Press last night.
“We never received that letter or that notification,” Whitman had said after a campaign event in San Jose.
As we previously wrote, the SSA website says that when employers receive a so-called “no-match” letter, they should make sure there was not a typographical error and ask to see the employee’s Social Security card to ensure they have the right information. If the issue cannot be resolved, they are supposed to ask their employee to contact their local Social Security office. Allred said that the press conference that the law said it was up to the employer to make sure the employee had checked in with SSA.
Whitman said at a press conference earlier Wednesday that it was possible that her maid had intercepted the 2003 government letter since she was in charge of getting the mail.
“She might have been on the lookout for that letter,” Whitman said. “It would pain me to believe that that’s what she might have done but I have no other explanation.”
Allred laid on the rhetoric pretty thick at her second press conference in as many days, calling Whitman a liar and praising her client.
“I am so proud of Nicky. She is the hero in this story. She is the courageous Rosa Parks of the movement to win respect and dignity for Latinas and others in the workplace,” Allred said at the Thursday press conference.
Later Update: The Whitman campaign issued this response from Whitman’s husband, Dr. Griff Harsh:
“While I honestly do not recall receiving this letter, as it was sent to me seven years ago, I can say it is possible that I would’ve scratched a follow up note on a letter like this, which is a request for information to make certain Nicky received her Social Security benefits and W-2 tax refund for withheld wages. Since we believed her to be legal, I would have had no reason to suspect that she would not have filled it in and done what was needed to secure her benefits.
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