A Democrat running for re-election to the Virginia House of Delegates once worked for a congressman who “liked attractive women around” in his Capitol Hill office because it helped him get the upper hand in political negotiations.

Delegate Kathleen Murphy, who represents parts of Fairfax and Loudoun Counties in Northern Virginia, got her start in politics in the 1990s working for Democratic Texas Rep. Charlie Wilson, who referred to female staffers as “Charlie’s Angels.”

During a March 2012 interview with a Stephen F. Austin State University professor in Washington, D.C., Murphy explained what it was like for women working in Wilson’s office.

“Well, I was a Charlie’s Angel. I mean you don’t work for Charlie and not be a Charlie’s Angel,” Murphy said in 2012. The Virginia delegate added that the former Texas congressman “liked attractive women around because we diverted attention and gave him the upper hand” when dealing with his political rivals.

It was during the same 2012 interview that Murphy revealed that those with whom Wilson negotiated “were very busy looking at a few of the women that worked for him.”

Murphy did not immediately respond to The Daily Caller by phone or email when asked to comment.

TheDC’s reporting on Murphy’s 2012 statements about Wilson comes amid a heightened national discussion about the treatment of women in the workplace. Hollywood movie mogul Harvey Weinstein was dismissed earlier this month from the company he co-founded over multiple allegations of sexual harassment and even rape. This week, the New York Times reported that former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly settled with yet another one of his former female colleagues, Lis Wiehl, for a staggering $32 million.

Before going to work for Wilson on the Hill, Murphy volunteered in the Clinton White House. Murphy was the ex-wife of former Democratic New York Rep. John Murphy, who was convicted more than a decade earlier on bribery and conspiracy charges after an FBI undercover sting expose one of the largest public corruption scandals in American history.

Murphy said in 2012 that she knew Wilson personally through her marriage to the congressman. In the same interview, Murphy recalled having lunch with Wilson and others at the Clinton White House in the 1990s.

“I went to work over in [Second Lady Tipper Gore’s] office and had lunch with Charlie one day. He brought [his wife] Jerry along, and we reminisced and had a hoot of a time,” Murphy said.

“Then he and I talked again several times, and he asked me how it was going with Tipper.”

“I said, well, if I didn’t get a job soon I would be the only volunteer at the White House who was going to go on welfare,” Murphy said she told Wilson in an “off the cuff remark.” Murphy said Wilson called a few days after their White House meeting to offer her a job in his congressional office.

“He asked me if I knew what a markup was. I said, ‘of course not, you must be kidding.’ I was married to a member of Congress, I have no idea how this works, but I knew all of the people,” Murphy said.

That’s when Wilson said Murphy told her to “take the job, you’re a smart chick, and you’ll learn.”

Murphy worked in Wilson’s office for two years and became known as one of “Charlie’s Angels.” Wilson served 12 terms in Congress and inspired the movie “Charlie Wilson’s Wars.” He died in 2010.