FLASHBACK: Al Franken PRAISED His "Beautiful" Sexual Assault Accuser on the Senate Floor in 2010

Democratic Sen. Al Franken (Minn.) made a Senate floor speech in 2010 in which he referenced the woman by name who has accused him of sexually assaulting her, calling her "a beautiful woman."



Leeann Tweeden, now a Los Angeles-based radio news anchor, alleged Thursday that Franken aggressively kissed her without consent while they were rehearsing for a skit during a USO tour in 2006. She also posted a photograph of a smiling Franken grabbing her breasts through her flak vest while she slept on a plane ride home from the Middle East.



Franken said he remembered the rehearsal differently but apologized for his actions, and he said he would cooperate with an ethics investigation into his actions.



CNN found a clip of Franken talking about Tweeden while speaking on the Senate floor on Sept. 21, 2010. The remarks he made about Tweeden were not part of his prepared remarks, according to a transcript of the speech on his website.



Franken went to the floor to discuss repealing the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy for homosexual service members. He began discussing his experiences doing USO tours and diverged from his prepared remarks to specifically talk about one particular tour.



"The last four years, I was in Iraq and Afghanistan and Kuwait, and I'd go with a very eclectic tour of guys and women. Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders. Country western artists," Franken said. "Almost all of them were very right-wing, and we love each other, because we went on these tours."



He then discussed one show in particular that involved Tweeden and lasted four hours.



"During the show, I was kind of a co-host with a beautiful woman named Leeann Tweeden, and we'd do comedy routines, and we'd introduce music and introduce the cheerleaders, and I'd go out and do a monologue. And this was something I would do—I'd done for a number of years," Franken said.