The Republican leadership was struggling on Wednesday to stop a scandal over a Florida congressman’s sexually charged e-mail exchanges with teenage congressional assistants spiralling into an election debacle, amid growing pressure for the House speaker to stand down.
With five weeks to go until the midterm elections, Republican strategists believe they must repudiate a party leadership that failed to act against the congressman — or risk losing control of the House of Representatives. Polls on Wednesday showed the scandal taking a toll on Republican electoral prospects, with one survey putting the Democrats within striking distance of taking control of the House.
Mark Foley, a six-term congressman who led a personal crusade against online sexual predators, resigned last week after being confronted with suggestive e-mails written to a former teenage male assistant, or page. Foley is now under FBI investigation.
His lawyer insists that he never had sexual contact with a minor. In the days since his exit from Congress Foley has admitted to alcoholism, acknowledged being gay and revealed that he was a victim of abuse by Catholic clergy as a teenager.
The drip-feed of revelations has intensified the pressure on Republicans to demonstrate a more emphatic response to the scandal.
The first in the line of fire is the House Speaker, Dennis Hastert, whose office knew about Foley’s behaviour for nearly a year but did not seek an investigation until after the damaging e-mail had become public.
Hastert’s career was hanging in the balance on Wednesday, with the speaker admitting: ”If I thought it could help the party, I would consider it.”
In the past few days Hastert has been attacked by Republicans worried about keeping their seats. Democrats have already begun to use the Foley scandal in TV ads. ”We have to do something different, more dramatic,” congressman Ray LaHood told reporters. ”This is a political mess and what we have done so far is not working.”
The momentum for Hastert’s departure gathered pace on Tuesday, when his deputy, the House majority leader, John Boehner, told a radio station in Ohio that he believed the speaker had had responsibility to deal with Foley when he learned of his activities. ”I believe I talked to the speaker and he told me it had been taken care of,” Boehner said. ”And my position is [that] … it’s his responsibility.”
News reports on Wednesday suggested Hastert would hang on until the end of the year to avoid a leadership battle, but he would not seek re-election to his post.
His might not be the only high-ÂÂprofile Republican departure, with anger building against campaign chief Thomas Reynolds. He also knew about Foley’s e-mails and has said he will not return $100 000 raised for the party by Foley. Reynolds was aware of the e-mail exchanges when he received the funds.
The urgency of finding an exit from the scandal was underlined for the Republicans on Wednesday by a Wall Street Journal poll in which 41% of respondents said they felt less positively towards the Republicans than they had only weeks ago.
Meanwhile, another poll put the Democrats well within reach of taking control of the House of Representatives. The party needs to gain 15 seats to reclaim the House, which has had a Republican majority since 1994. Democratic candidates now lead Republicans in 11 of 15 closely contested seats, the Reuter-Zogby poll said.
Republicans readily admit their concern that the lurid details about Foley’s contacts with the pages would alienate Christian conservatives. — Â