Following a growing tide of second-hand allegations on Twitter of harassment, with an accompanying tide of media investigating and making inquiries, author Sherman Alexie issued a statement on Wednesday in which he apologized broadly to “the people I have hurt,” admitting vaguely to making “poor decisions.”
In the same statement, he directly and specifically “reject[s] the accusations, insinuations and outright falsehoods made by Litsa Dremousis, who has led the charges against me” on Twitter. Alexie says that he and Dremousis “had previously been consenting sexual partners,” ending that relationship in 2015. In late 2017, Alexie writes that Dremousis emailed his wife about their former relationship and “since then, has continually tweeted and spoken in public about my behavior, making accusations based on rumors and hearsay….”
Alexie writes in general: “There are women telling the truth about my behavior and I have no recollection of physically or verbally threatening anybody or their careers. That would be completely out of character. I have made poor decisions and I am working hard to become a healthier man who makes healthier decisions. Again, I apologize to the people I have hurt. I am genuine sorry.”
Dremousis tells the Seattle Times “she had been open with reporters about the affair,” though she did not include that in her Twitter threads, and “she had earlier told The Seattle Times it was off the record.” She says she has been working with NPR to interview women on record about Alexie — “We’ve recorded five or six already” — but no piece has aired yet. “Once the NPR story is out, it nullifies everything,” she tells the newspaper.
In her own statement on Facebook, Dremousis writes, “I knew he’d use a consensual affair which ended w/ us staying good friends as a way to discredit dozens of women *who consented to nothing*.” She also notes, “I put a huge chunk of my private life out there of my own volition b/c I wanted him to stop harming women.” Dremousis closes her post: “A man I confronted four months ago about his sexual harassment of women finally issued a statement wherein he doesn’t deny it. That’s all I’ll say I’ll for now.”
Alexie’s most recent book, the memoir You Don’t Have To Say You Love Me, was published by Little, Brown in 2017.
Little, Brown has not commented on the record, but a person at the company familiar with their plans confirmed that the trade paperback edition of Alexie’s 2017 memoir You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me will release as planned on April 24.