Staff Report
Concerns about a lawsuit involving UNM presidential candidate David Schmidly dominated the open question portion of the faculty's meeting with him.
In a 2002 lawsuit against Texas Tech, of which Schmidly was president at the time, he was accused of discriminating against a woman and referring to her in "the lewdest and crudest of terms" during a search for a dean.
The lawsuit was dismissed in 2003.
Schmidly said he is not guilty of the allegations in the lawsuit.
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"The comment that was attributed to me was never made," he said. "I've denied it ever since day one, and I will deny it until I die."
Schmidly said he is not sexist.
"I have a wife," he said. "I have a daughter. I have a granddaughter. I would not use that term. You have no idea how these accusations pain me."
The provost and four deans at Oklahoma State University are women, he said.
Schmidly also spoke about the lawsuit at the meeting with staff, although the audience did not prompt him.
One staff member asked Schmidly if the lawsuit would put him on the defensive when he begins his job as president.
Schmidly said it would not.
"If I come here, you can judge me by my record and the kind of person I am," he said. "Look at that record and ask yourself, does that appear to be the record of
a bigot?"
