Ohio candidate: had to quit P&G job to campaign

A candidate for the U.S. House said Monday that Procter & Gamble Co. told him he would have to quit his job if he wanted to run for Congress.

Democrat Justin Coussoule said in a statement that he chose to continue his campaign against Republican House Minority Leader John Boehner in the Eighth Congressional District rather than keep his job with P&G. His decision was first reported by The Cincinnati Enquirer.

Coussoule said he had asked P&G managers in February before filing for office if he could run and keep his job and take a leave of absence. His managers told him he could continue to work at P&G while running for office, but they had not reached a final decision on the leave of absence, he said.

"Having relied on the company's original response to my inquiry, and having raised tens of thousands of dollars, built a campaign organization and actively campaigned for nearly three months, I chose to remain a candidate," he said.

P&G has a policy set 20 years ago establishing guidelines for employees engaging in political activities that could have an impact the company's business, company spokeswoman Robyn Schroeder said Monday.

Some P&G employees have run for other elected offices, including nonpartisan school board seats, Schroeder said. However, she noted that offices such as Congress that P&G might lobby on certain matters could involve a conflict of interest.

Other P&G employees have been affected by the policy, and one in South Boston recently resigned when he chose to run for the Massachusetts Legislature, she said.

Coussoule said that his bosses never made him aware of the policy until April, when officials produced an undated hard copy of a written policy that he says they acknowledged was not previously available online or anywhere else to company employees.

"They acknowledged that I had never been made aware of this newly produced policy and that there was no way I would have known about its existence," he said.

Schroeder said she was not privy to the initial conversations, but added that the policy is currently available to employees on the company's internal web site.

Bruce Abel, a Cincinnati employment lawyer who represents employees, said he hasn't seen enough to know if such a policy is typical for companies. But he said he understands P&G's position.

"I can see that there could be a conflict of interest, in particular for a consumer products company that wouldn't want to offend Democrats or Republicans," he said. "And basically by running for Congress, you are saying you are wanting to leave the company, because you are seeking a full-time job in Congress."