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The late House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) was an accidental speaker.
And it was a sheer accident that the world learned a dark secret about Hastert, years after he left Capitol Hill.
It was 20 years ago, almost to the date. House Republicans were on the verge of losing their majority in the 2006 midterms. And their speaker, Dennis Hastert, was in meltdown.
HIGHEST-RANKING US OFFICIAL TO EVER SERVE JAIL TIME, FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER DENNIS HASTERT DEAD AT 84
Word had just broken that then-Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) had sent inappropriate messages to high school-age male teens, serving as House pages. The Republican-led House was meeting on September 29, 2006, trying to escape town so the GOP could defend their majority. But nothing was going right for Republicans. The public was growing weary of President George W. Bush and the war in Iraq. Democrats were poised to retake the House in November.
Yours truly and Deirdre Walsh — then of CNN — spotted the portly Hastert lumbering across Statuary Hall toward the speaker’s office.
“Did he call you?” Walsh asked Hastert about Foley.
“What are you going to do about it?” I inquired.
“We’ll talk about that shortly,” mumbled Hastert under his breath, his wide glasses nearly tumbling over the bridge of his nose as he huffed into the speaker’s suite.
An hour later, Hastert, outgoing Senate majority leader.
Bill Frist (R-TN) and other top Republicans convened a brief press conference to tout a national security bill they just passed. The legislation was designed as the GOP sendoff as lawmakers went home to campaign.
“OK, we’ll take questions. Only on the bill,” instructed Frist. “Only on the bill.”
No one even squeaked.
Finally, I piped up.
“We have questions about other subjects,” I announced, determined to ask about Foley.
“Alright,” said Frist, shoving back from the table.
The Tennessee Republican knew what was coming. Frist was happy he wouldn’t have to address Foley. That was something for Hastert. Especially since Frist planned to run for president in 2008.
I inquired about Foley. Hastert muttered a non-answer which was barely usable for broadcast. He mumbled something about him not being “very happy” about Foley. But it was a soundbite from the speaker of the House on the scandal, right as a bloodied GOP hit the exits for the midterm campaign.
Someone then quickly adjourned the press conference. And that was it.
FORMER REPUBLICAN HOUSE SPEAKER DENNIS HASTERT DEAD AT 84
A few days later, local reporters in Illinois pressed Hastert about how he handled the Foley matter. Back in Washington, asked one of the speaker’s aides why Hastert – as a former teacher and coach – wasn’t more aggressive protecting the teen pages.
We may have found out why years later.
Eighty-four-year-old Dennis Hastert died of natural causes over the weekend. The late speaker is one of the most ignominious figures in American politics.
He was the longest-serving Republican speaker in history, wielding the gavel from 1999 to 2007. Hastert stumbled into the speakership, rising thanks to the missteps of others. Yet despite his years in Congress, what we learned about Hastert nearly a decade after he left office revealed him to be one of the most grotesque persons to ever serve in Congress. In fact, Hastert is the highest-serving U.S. official to ever serve jail time.
Virtually no one knew it, but Hastert was an unbridled sexual predator. Known as “Coach” rather than “Mr. Speaker” to his Capitol colleagues, Hastert preyed on teenage boys when he taught high school in the 1960s and 1970s.
Hastert was never implicated in the page scandal. The House nixed the program soon afterwards, even though it was nearly as old as the republic. But in retrospect, how Hastert fumbled what was going on with the House pages shockingly added up later.
Democrats won the House handily in the 2006 midterms. Hastert didn’t run – and probably wouldn’t have won – a leadership race in the new Congress. He stuck around as rank-and-file member for a few months and resigned in late 2007.
Few heard much from Hastert after he departed Congress. Such was his style. He shunned interviews as speaker and was rarely even spotted in the Capitol corridors. To defend his reticence with the press corps, the speaker proclaimed that he was more of a “listener.”
And then Hastert’s otherwise bland, nearly forgotten speakership took a dark turn in 2015.
Federal banking regulators flagged Hastert’s curious withdrawals of staggering amounts of cash. They suspected the transactions signaled that someone could be blackmailing the former speaker. So they investigated. But that’s how it came to light that Hastert was actually paying hush money to conceal his sexual transgressions with minors.
The feds indicted Hastert on charges of lying to investigators and evading banking laws. He later pleaded guilty to the bank crimes. Prosecutors dropped the charge of making false statements. Federal Judge Thomas Durkin declared that the former speaker was “a serial child molester.” In court, Hastert admitted that he “mistreated athletes” and “took advantage” of those he was supposed to mentor.
Prosecutors never charged Hastert in connection with sex crimes. He served 13 months of a 15-month sentence at a federal facility in Rochester, Minn.
It’s remarkable that someone who operated at this level of American government obscured such a hideous secret for so long.
And as instructive as the day nearly 20 years ago when the Foley scandal broke and Republicans were on the verge of losing the House, unceremoniously terminating Hastert’s speakership — the day that propelled him into the leadership is even more illuminating.
Republicans nearly lost the House in the 1998 midterms. House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) was toxic and Republicans showed him the door. In late 1998, Republicans tapped then-Rep. Bob Livingston (R-LA), chairman of the Appropriations Committee, to become speaker in 1999. But then came December 19, 1998. The Saturday before Christmas.
I was on the job on 9/11. I was on the job on January 6. I’ve covered Congress for a litany of big hearings, the removal of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA). Even the day they banished Pete Rose from Major League Baseball as a kid reporter back in Cincinnati. You name it, I’ve seen it.
But from a sheer news perspective, December 19, 1998, rivals many of those.
The House met on that Saturday before Christmas to approve articles of impeachment against President Clinton for the Monica Lewinsky scandal. This would mark only the second time in American history that the House impeached an American president.
President Clinton also ordered airstrikes against Iraq for violating no-fly zones following the first Gulf War that day. So that story was in full force. But the night before, there was news that Livingston – the GOP’s speaker in waiting – had an affair with a lobbyist.
Juxtapose that with what the House was trying to do with Clinton because of his sexual exploits.
On the morning of December 19, 1998, Livingston took to the House floor to demand that the president resign for his transgressions.
“No! You resign! You resign!” came a cacophony of catcalls from Democrats in unison in the House chamber.
Livingston paused and held up his hand to quiet the din.
The Louisiana Republican then announced he would not stand as the GOP’s nominee for speaker when the new Congress convened in January 1999. He promised to resign from the House a few months later.
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Bedlam tore through the Capitol.
House Republicans scrambled. They needed a new speaker-designee.
By nightfall, they conscripted J. Dennis Hastert for the job. The chief deputy whip in the Republican Conference. Hastert was a part of the GOP leadership team. But he was a backbencher. His obscure leadership slot was to help count votes on the floor.
Many reporters who covered Congress didn’t even know who Hastert was.
Hastert was barely vetted by the press corps.
But there was other big news. Airstrikes against Iraq. The Livingston scandal. That’s to say nothing of only the second impeachment trial of a president in American history.
GOT A TIP?
Hastert seized the speaker’s gavel in January 1999. He remained on the job for another eight years. Longer than any other Republican. His odious past obscured.
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But ultimately, Dennis Hastert did not take to the grave the loathsome secrets he hid for so long.
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