The Tom Reynolds-Mark Foley Connection

As early as 2001, there were warnings about Republican Congressman Mark Foley's behavior. Foley's emails to underage pages should have raised a major red flag and the Republican leadership, including Rep. Reynolds, should have investigated immediately. But like numerous other Republican leaders, Reynolds failed to ask the tough questions, choosing instead to cover up the facts. If they had investigated, they would have likely discovered the now widely reported additional sexually explicit communications showing that Rep. Foley was communicating with multiple children and inviting minors to dinner. As the details of the cover-up continue to come to light, the conservative Washington Times today called for Speaker Hastert to step down. But, what about Tom Reynolds?

According to the Palm Beach Post, Kirk Fordham, who currently is chief-of-staff for NRCC Chairman Tom Reynolds (R-NY), also previously worked as Foley's chief of staff for 10 years and returned to Foley's side to advise him during the past couple of days.[Palm Beach Post, 9/30/06]

News reports indicate that a former Foley chief of staff, by all indications Fordham, tried to broker a deal with ABC News' Brian Ross. According to Howard Kurtz's column in the The Washington Post yesterday, Ross had asked to interview the Florida Republican after obtaining dozens of instant messages that Foley sent to teenage House pages. Foley's former chief of staff told Ross on Friday that the congressman was quitting and that Ross could have that information exclusively if he agreed not to publish the raw, sexually explicit messages. [Washington Post, 10/2/06]

Some Questions About Reynolds's Involvement:

1. Why did Congressman Reynolds authorize his own chief of staff to negotiate on behalf of disgraced Congressman Mark Foley? Did Reynolds know about the lewd IM conversations when he let Fordham advise Foley, and if so, when was he informed? Did Fordham share the IMs with Reynolds?

2. Instead of dispatching his chief-of-staff to keep ABC News from breaking the story, why didn't Reynolds put the children first and go to authorities? Was Reynolds more worried about a political scandal than the safety of the children serving as Congressional pages?

3. What other assistance did Reynolds provide to help Foley avoid the scandal and the disgrace and possible criminal prosecution that would result?

4. Why is the NRCC refusing to return $100,000 from Foley, given that Reynolds knew of this disturbing behavior when the money was given in July of this year?