Local veteran tells CNN Sen. Al Franken groped her

MAINEVILLE - At 11:40 a.m., a newspaper reporter takes pictures of Stephanie Kemplin's house with his phone. 

Another reporter walks across the street to talk to a neighbor who just pulled into his driveway.

At the end of the cul-de-sac, a reporter working for a publication in Minnesota waits in her car. She will leave and return several times throughout the day.

A news van sits running on the curb outside Kemplin's house.

This is several roundabouts away from the entrance of Village on the Green, deep into a suburban development in rural Warren County.

It's Thursday, and there are several business cards stuck in Kemplin's front door. A greeting card addressed to her sits in her mailbox, next to another business card with a note on it.

That's because Kemplin, 41, is one of at least five women to accuse Sen. Al Franken of touching them inappropriately.

At 11:46 a.m., as one reporter leaves, another news van pulls in.

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Kemplin lives in Maineville near Hamilton Township in Warren County. 

She's an Army veteran who told CNN in a piece published Thursday that Franken groped her in 2003. 

She wasn't home when a reporter from The Enquirer knocked on her door, and a voicemail left at her work was not immediately returned.

Kemplin said the incident happened when she was deployed in Kuwait and Franken was visiting American troops with the USO, according to CNN.

Franken was a comedian known for his work on "Saturday Night Live." 

A longtime fan of the television show, Kemplin got in line for a photo with Franken. When he put his arm around her, she told CNN, he groped her right breast.

"I remember clenching up and how you just feel yourself flushed," she said in an interview with CNN. 

"And I remember thinking -- is he going to move his hand? Was it an accident? Was he going to move his hand? He never moved his hand."

Kemplin said the touching lasted anywhere from five to 10 seconds. She said she eventually turned her body to shift Franken's hand off her breast before the picture was taken.

She is smiling in the picture, which she shared with CNN. 

Kemplin is the second person to accuse Franken of inappropriate behavior while he was on a USO tour.

A spokesperson for Franken responded to the new allegations with this statement:

“As Sen. Franken made clear this week, he takes thousands of photos and has met tens of thousands of people and he has never intentionally engaged in this kind of conduct. He remains fully committed to cooperating with the ethics investigation.”

CNN spoke to Kemplin's older sister and an ex-boyfriend who both remembered being told about the incident.

The Enquirer wrote about Kemplin in 2004.

The article, "We care, troops, West-Siders say", detailed Kemplin's efforts to help West Side residents in Cincinnati prepare care packages to send to troops in Iraq around Christmas.

Kemplin, who according to CNN now works as a federal contractor investigating Medicare fraud, is a registered Republican and said she voted for President Donald Trump in the 2016 election.

More from CNN:

"When he put his arm around me, he groped my right breast. He kept his hand all the way over on my breast," Kemplin said in an interview. "I've never had a man put their arm around me and then cup my breast. So he was holding my breast on the side."

Kemplin repeatedly used the word "embarrassed" to describe her immediate reaction at the time.

"I remember clenching up and how you just feel yourself flushed," she said. "And I remember thinking -- is he going to move his hand? Was it an accident? Was he going to move his hand? He never moved his hand."

She added: "It was long enough that he should have known if it was an accident. I'm very confident saying that."

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Looking back at the picture, Kemplin said she recalls feeling frozen and numb: "I did not process it in those split seconds."

At a press conference in Washington, D.C. this week before Kemplin's story was published, Franken said he was shocked and extremely humbled by the allegations. He has apologized but not resigned.

"I am embarrassed," he said. "I feel ashamed."

At 5:30 p.m. in Maineville, there were still at least two reporters in Kemplin's neighborhood. 

As kids rode bikes on the sidewalk and one neighbor raked leaves outside, Kemplin was not home.