Four people from Utah political circles — three of them elected officials — accuse Eva Lopez Chavez, a Salt Lake City Council member and Democratic congressional candidate, of restraining them during what they considered unwanted sexual advances.

Lopez Chavez, through attorney Greg Skordas, said nothing “inappropriate” occurred during her interactions with three of the people and the fourth alleged contact “never occurred.” She is “shocked by the allegations,” a statement from Skordas said. “She is prepared to address them in any forum. She stands ready to submit to a polygraph test regarding these various allegations if requested.”

Victoria Petro, who is Lopez Chavez’s fellow City Council member; Maggie Regier, who worked on Stan Penfold’s mayoral campaign in 2019; Hoang Nguyen, who is now a state representative; and Jen Plumb, now a state senator, described their allegations in interviews with The Salt Lake Tribune. Each person said their allegations arose in social settings before Lopez Chavez joined the City Council in 2023.

Petro, Regier and Nguyen said they told others at the time, which The Tribune confirmed.

None of the four reported the interactions to police or spoke about them publicly until now. They said they decided to come forward, in part, because of Lopez Chavez’s candidacy for Congress in Utah’s new 1st District and after her reaction to newly disclosed online posts that fellow candidate Nate Blouin made between 2009 and 2015, including statements that minimized sexual assault.

In her statement in response to Blouin’s posts, Lopez Chavez described herself as a survivor of domestic violence and sexual assault and said Blouin should drop out of the race. Leadership, she said, is “defined by integrity and consistency — especially in how we treat women and respond to harm.”

She added: “Our communities deserve leaders who take these issues seriously — not just in rhetoric but in conduct. We cannot excuse behavior — past or present — that trivializes or undermines the seriousness of sexual violence, assault and harassment.”

The four said they felt Lopez Chavez’s statement ignored her own alleged treatment of women.

[READ: Eva Lopez Chavez will ‘continue fighting’ amid allegations of sexual misconduct during congressional race]

In February, saying he was spurred by his and others’ concerns about Lopez Chavez’s conduct, Council Chair Alejandro Puy directed the council’s executive director to review council policies for gaps and recommend “clear, consistent guidelines that protect staff, councilmembers, and constituents alike.”

In an email, Puy wrote: “I need to be direct: The reports and firsthand accounts of Council member Eva Lopez Chavez’s past behavior cannot be dismissed or minimized. Based on my own firsthand knowledge, and the experience of some of my colleagues on the council, they do not describe an isolated incident. They suggest a pattern of conduct that has affected colleagues in our own council, myself and many others in our community and has shaped our working environment.”

The review is still being conducted. Puy said in the email that, “when safety and institutional integrity are at issue, inaction is not an option for me.”

Skordas said that Lopez Chavez has filed complaints with the city against Puy and Petro, but they are unrelated to any alleged inappropriate contact with anyone; rather, “they address how Eva perceives her fellow council members are treating her.”

‘It’s my story’

In September 2022, Petro said, she and other council members went to a party after the wedding of a former council member.

At the event, Petro alleges, Lopez Chavez grabbed her by the throat, “pushed me back against a pillar so that my back was against the wall and told me, ‘The only reason I still f--- men is because a woman hasn’t shown me what I really want.’”

Petro said she froze, but remembers pushing Lopez Chavez’s hand away and walking away. She said she told Puy about what she considered to be an assault. Puy confirmed she talked to him shortly after the party, and, he said, Petro “was kind of shocked at what had happened.”

In her interview with The Tribune, Petro asked, “If a man had done that to me, would there be a question if it was assault or not?”

When Lopez Chavez ran for City Council in 2023, Petro said, she told a few of Lopez Chavez’s supporters about what she alleges occurred. Once Lopez Chavez won her council race, the two women met for lunch and Lopez Chavez, Petro said, told her to stop telling people her story.

“At that point, I said, ‘You shouldn’t have given me a story to tell,’” Petro said. “It’s my story.”

Skordas said there are photos and videos of the party that show people dancing and that “pictures of Victoria show her smiling and laughing with others, including Eva.”

He denied that Lopez Chavez made the comment that Petro alleged. “Nothing inappropriate happened and no one ever expressed any concern about Eva’s conduct,” Skordas said.

Petro has publicly endorsed candidate Ben McAdams in the 1st District race.

‘Knock it off’

State Sen. Jen Plumb, D-Salt Lake City, alleges Lopez Chavez pushed her against a wall at a friend’s birthday party in November 2022.

“It absolutely was a sexual advance. She leaned into me, grabbed onto my a–, got up in my face and said in my ear, ‘You’re sure you’re straight?’” Plumb said. “I just pushed her away. Come on. Knock it off.”

Plumb said she mostly dismissed it at the time, but now sees it differently.

“I’ve got to do some work on why I saw it that way, but I would not be comfortable with someone doing that to my daughter, to my mom, my best friends,” Plumb said, “and I’m not comfortable with it being brushed away anymore.”

Skordas said Lopez Chavez “never touched Jen Plumb.”

“It never occurred,” he said, adding Lopez Chavez has numerous texts and photos, none of which “support any allegation of improper touching or statements.”

“Eva holds Plumb in the highest regard, considering her a good friend and colleague,” he said. “Some of their communications are very recent.”

Plumb provided The Tribune with what she said were her most recent text messages from Lopez Chavez. One was an invitation to an event in June 2025, which Plumb said she declined.

She received the second one in February, she said, when Lopez Chavez wrote she had “heard some feedback regarding how you express our professional relationship that doesn’t align with my experience” and wanted to meet to discuss it. Plumb, according to the messages she shared, did not respond.

‘What are you doing?’

Nguyen, who is now a state representative, said Lopez Chavez attended a campaign event for Plumb in the Avenues neighborhood of Salt Lake City in 2022. As Nguyen was leaving the party, she said, Lopez Chavez asked for a ride to her car.

After she drove a few blocks, Nguyen said, Lopez Chavez told her to pull over — which she did, believing they had arrived at her car. “Next thing I know she has leaned over and she’s on top of me, holding my shoulders down,” Nguyen said in an interview.

“I said, ‘What are you doing?’ And she said, ‘Kiss me,’” Nguyen said. “She said, ‘I’m not going to get off you until you kiss me.’ I gave her a peck and she got off.”

The next day Nguyen told a mutual friend. The person, a prominent Salt Lake City business owner and community volunteer, confirmed the version of events to The Tribune, which agreed not to name the business owner because they fear retribution.

Asked by The Tribune about her recollection of the interaction with Nguyen in the car and whether she disputes Nguyen’s account, Lopez Chavez did not address it.

“Eva and Hoang have a series of friendly texts between them that show nothing inappropriate ever occurred,” Skordas said. “There is never any mention of unwanted or inappropriate contact between the two of them.”

Skordas said the communication between Lopez Chavez and Nguyen is “friendly and cordial” and “can be shared at the appropriate time.”

‘Leave Maggie alone’

Regier, who uses they/them pronouns, was working on Stan Penfold’s mayoral campaign in 2019 when they went to a Human Rights Campaign fundraising event that Lopez Chavez was also attending, they said. Regier said Lopez Chavez was being “flirty” and led them around the room by the wrist.

Regier tried to deflect Lopez Chavez’s attention and excuse themself from the situation, they said, but Lopez Chavez pulled Regier “into a literal corner in the hallway” and pinned them against the wall, refusing to let them leave. A friend of Regier’s stepped in and separated them, they said.

Later, Regier was with a friend on the dance floor, they said, “and [Lopez Chavez] was kind of trying to grab on to me and another friend physically stepped between us and pushed her off of me and was like, ‘Leave Maggie alone.’”

Regier’s supervisor on the campaign, Corey Cronin, confirmed that Regier told him about the interaction the next day in tears. Regier said it was “an incredibly embarrassing moment” for them, Cronin said, and that they had felt like they were “being harassed by somebody [they] had a lot of respect for and [they] kept saying ‘no.’” Regier said, he added, that they were “very upset by the repeated advances and lack of taking no for an answer.”

When Lopez Chavez ran for City Council in 2023, Regier posted about Lopez Chavez’s alleged actions at the fundraiser on social media, calling it “harassment” and saying, “it made me feel incredibly unsafe.”

“If she wants to run for Congress, then she needs to be held to a behavioral standard,” Regier, who has since moved out of state, said in an interview. “Especially if she’s going to call out other candidates to be held to some sort of behavioral standard. And it’s just this pattern of behavior.”

Lopez Chavez and Regier “played and laughed,” Skordas said of their interaction at the fundraiser, “but no one was inappropriate in any way nor was there any unwanted contact.”

He added: “Eva remembers Maggie’s friend mentioning that Maggie wanted to be left alone and no further communication occurred between them.” It’s “false,” Skordas said, that Lopez Chavez had to be pulled off of Regier.

In a statement, a spokesperson for Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall said the administration was not made aware of any allegations against Lopez Chavez when she worked for the city as a community liaison before she ran for office.

“Appropriate steps would have been taken immediately had the office been made aware of any such allegations,” the spokesperson said.

Skordas said that during Lopez Chavez’s service in the Salt Lake County Democratic Party she helped draft a code of conduct for the party. She has communications from the four people, he said, that are “entirely inconsistent with these untrue allegations.”