IHT : Republican congressman resigns amid questions about e-mails to teenager

Republican congressman resigns amid questions about e-mails to teenager

The Associated Press | September 29, 2006

WASHINGTON A prominent House Republican has resigned after the revelation that he exchanged raunchy electronic messages with a teenage boy, a former congressional page.

Rep. Mark Foley of Florida, who is single, apologized Friday for letting down his family and constituents. Pages are high school students who attend classes under congressional supervision and work as messengers.

Once his resignation letter was read to the House late Friday afternoon, Republicans spent the night trying to explain — six weeks before congressional elections — how this could have happened on their watch.

Near midnight, they engineered a vote to let the House ethics committee decide whether an investigation is needed.

Among the Republican explanations during the night, the congressional sponsor of the page, Rep. Rodney Alexander, said he was asked by the youth's parents not to pursue the matter, so he dropped it.

Alexander said that before deciding to end his involvement, he passed on what he knew to the chairman of the House Republican campaign organization, Rep. Thomas Reynolds. Reynolds' spokesman, Carl Forti, said the campaign chairman also took no action in deference to the parents' wishes.

Rep. John Shimkus, chairman of the Page Board that oversees the congressional work-study program for high schoolers, said he did investigate but Foley falsely assured him he was only mentoring the boy.

The spokesman for Speaker Dennis Hastert, Ron Bonjean, said the top House Republican had not known about the allegations. Shimkus said he learned about them in late 2005.

Just as Shimkus' explanation was released, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi proposed to the House that its ethics committee investigate and make a preliminary report in 10 days. She demanded to know who knew of the messages, whether Foley had other contacts with pages and when the Republican leadership was notified of Foley's conduct.

Instead, majority Republicans engineered a vote to allow the ethics panel to decide whether there should even be an investigation.

Foley's departure sent Republicans scrambling for a replacement candidate.

Foley, 52, had been almost certain to gain a new term until the e-mail correspondence surfaced in recent days. The page was 16 at the time of the correspondence.

Foley's resignation further complicates the political landscape for Republicans, who are fighting to retain control of Congress. Democrats need to win a net of 15 Republican seats to regain the power they lost in 1994.

Florida Republicans planned to meet as soon as Monday to name a replacement in Foley's district, which President George W. Bush won with 55 percent in 2004 and is now in play for November. Though Florida ballots have already been printed with Foley's name and cannot be changed, any votes for Foley will count toward the party's choice.

Hastert said Friday he had asked Shimkus to investigate the page system. "We want to make sure that all our pages are safe and the page system is safe," Hastert said.

ABC News reported Friday that Foley also engaged in a series of sexually explicit instant messages with current and former pages, all male. In one message, ABC said, Foley wrote to one page, "Do I make you a little horny?"

In another message, Foley wrote, "You in your boxers, too? ... Well, strip down and get relaxed."

Foley, as chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus, had introduced legislation in July to protect children from exploitation by adults over the Internet. He also sponsored other legislation designed to protect minors from abuse and neglect.

"We track library books better than we do sexual predators," Foley has said.

Foley e-mailed the page in August 2005. Foley asked the youth how he was doing after Hurricane Katrina and what he wanted for his birthday. The congressman also asked the boy to send a photo of himself, according to excerpts of the e-mails that were originally released by ABC News.

The e-mails were posted Friday on the Web site of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington after ABC News reported their existence.

Naomi Seligman, a spokeswoman for CREW, said the group also sent a letter to the FBI after it received the e-mails. CREW did not post their copies of the e-mail until ABC News reported them, instead waiting for the investigation.

"The House of Representatives has an obligation to protect the teenagers who come to Congress to learn about the legislative process," the group wrote.

According to the CREW posting, the boy e-mailed a colleague in Alexander's office about Foley's e-mails, saying, "This freaked me out." On the request for a photo, the boy repeated the word "sick" 13 times.

He said Foley asked for his e-mail when the boy gave him a thank-you card. The boy also said Foley wrote that he had e-mailed another page.


WASHINGTON A prominent House Republican has resigned after the revelation that he exchanged raunchy electronic messages with a teenage boy, a former congressional page.

Rep. Mark Foley of Florida, who is single, apologized Friday for letting down his family and constituents. Pages are high school students who attend classes under congressional supervision and work as messengers.

Once his resignation letter was read to the House late Friday afternoon, Republicans spent the night trying to explain — six weeks before congressional elections — how this could have happened on their watch.

Near midnight, they engineered a vote to let the House ethics committee decide whether an investigation is needed.

Among the Republican explanations during the night, the congressional sponsor of the page, Rep. Rodney Alexander, said he was asked by the youth's parents not to pursue the matter, so he dropped it.

Alexander said that before deciding to end his involvement, he passed on what he knew to the chairman of the House Republican campaign organization, Rep. Thomas Reynolds. Reynolds' spokesman, Carl Forti, said the campaign chairman also took no action in deference to the parents' wishes.

Rep. John Shimkus, chairman of the Page Board that oversees the congressional work-study program for high schoolers, said he did investigate but Foley falsely assured him he was only mentoring the boy.

The spokesman for Speaker Dennis Hastert, Ron Bonjean, said the top House Republican had not known about the allegations. Shimkus said he learned about them in late 2005.

Just as Shimkus' explanation was released, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi proposed to the House that its ethics committee investigate and make a preliminary report in 10 days. She demanded to know who knew of the messages, whether Foley had other contacts with pages and when the Republican leadership was notified of Foley's conduct.

Instead, majority Republicans engineered a vote to allow the ethics panel to decide whether there should even be an investigation.

Foley's departure sent Republicans scrambling for a replacement candidate.

Foley, 52, had been almost certain to gain a new term until the e-mail correspondence surfaced in recent days. The page was 16 at the time of the correspondence.

Foley's resignation further complicates the political landscape for Republicans, who are fighting to retain control of Congress. Democrats need to win a net of 15 Republican seats to regain the power they lost in 1994.

Florida Republicans planned to meet as soon as Monday to name a replacement in Foley's district, which President George W. Bush won with 55 percent in 2004 and is now in play for November. Though Florida ballots have already been printed with Foley's name and cannot be changed, any votes for Foley will count toward the party's choice.

Hastert said Friday he had asked Shimkus to investigate the page system. "We want to make sure that all our pages are safe and the page system is safe," Hastert said.

ABC News reported Friday that Foley also engaged in a series of sexually explicit instant messages with current and former pages, all male. In one message, ABC said, Foley wrote to one page, "Do I make you a little horny?"

In another message, Foley wrote, "You in your boxers, too? ... Well, strip down and get relaxed."

Foley, as chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus, had introduced legislation in July to protect children from exploitation by adults over the Internet. He also sponsored other legislation designed to protect minors from abuse and neglect.

"We track library books better than we do sexual predators," Foley has said.

Foley e-mailed the page in August 2005. Foley asked the youth how he was doing after Hurricane Katrina and what he wanted for his birthday. The congressman also asked the boy to send a photo of himself, according to excerpts of the e-mails that were originally released by ABC News.

The e-mails were posted Friday on the Web site of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington after ABC News reported their existence.

Naomi Seligman, a spokeswoman for CREW, said the group also sent a letter to the FBI after it received the e-mails. CREW did not post their copies of the e-mail until ABC News reported them, instead waiting for the investigation.

"The House of Representatives has an obligation to protect the teenagers who come to Congress to learn about the legislative process," the group wrote.

According to the CREW posting, the boy e-mailed a colleague in Alexander's office about Foley's e-mails, saying, "This freaked me out." On the request for a photo, the boy repeated the word "sick" 13 times.

He said Foley asked for his e-mail when the boy gave him a thank-you card. The boy also said Foley wrote that he had e-mailed another page.