Washington is abuzz with rumors of late-night partying and of House Republicans inappropriately hanging out with female lobbyists.
But not everyone was taken by surprise. Minority Leader John Boehner has been working behind the scenes to address the issue for at least the past year and a half.
The Ohio Republican has had private conversations with several lawmakers asking them to curb their inappropriate behavior. Boehner told the lawmakers that it was a “distraction” from the party’s goal of taking back the House, according to several sources familiar with the one-on-one talks.
Despite Boehner’s effort to head off a scandal, the issue came to the forefront last week when a conversation that Rep. Lee Terry had with a woman at a GOP watering hole became public.
“Why did you get me so drunk?” the Nebraska Republican asked a woman sitting next to him at the Capitol Hill Club during President Barack Obama’s June 15 speech about the Gulf Coast oil spill, according to a source who overheard the conversation.
The New York Post first reported the comment, though Roll Call’s source said it wasn’t intended to be flirtatious, as the Post reported, and Terry has denied it altogether.
“This attack on my character and my family’s reputation is obviously politically motivated and out of line,” Terry said in a statement. “The people of Nebraska know me and know that I would never hurt my family in such a way as depicted in the article.”
Terry likely faces a competitive re-election race against Democratic state Sen. Tom White.
Boehner first told Roll Call of his conversations with House Republicans in late May after he asked former Rep. Mark Souder to resign after the Indiana Republican had an extramarital affair with a staff member.
Boehner said he had spoken to several Members over the past year and a half who, he believed, had done something or came close to doing something unethical.
“I’ve had Members in here where I thought they crossed the line,” Boehner said at the time, mentioning former GOP Reps. John Doolittle (Calif.) and Rick Renzi (Ariz.). “I have had others I thought were approaching the line.”
Doolittle and Renzi stepped aside from their committee positions in 2007 after each of them came under federal investigation for unrelated incidents. Renzi faces corruption charges in federal court in Arizona; Doolittle has not been charged.
After a series of GOP ethical scandals in the 109th Congress helped catapult Democrats into the majority, Boehner said he pledged to his depleted Conference that he would not tolerate Members who flouted the rules or the law.
“I say what I mean. I mean what I say. I do what I say I’m going to do,” Boehner said. “I’m the most transparent person in this town. And I’ve done exactly what I promised my Members.”
Boehner spokesman Michael Steel declined to comment on the specifics of Boehner’s intervention with individual Members.
“We aren’t going to comment on rumors, and any conversations Boehner may or may not have had with other Members are private,” he said in an e-mail.
Several Republican lobbyists said the Terry incident is part of a larger concern involving a group of House Republicans and lobbyists, including Glenn LeMunyon of the LeMunyon Group, who regularly party with female lobbyists.
Rep. Bill Cassidy has his blood drawn by Alesha Barbour during a free hepatitis screening in the Rayburn House Office Building hosted by the Congressional Viral Hepatitis Caucus to recognize "National Viral Hepatitis Testing Day."
Roll Call has launched a new feature, Hill Navigator, to advise congressional staffers and would-be staffers on how to manage workplace issues on Capitol Hill. Please send us your questions — anything from office etiquette, to handling awkward moments, to what happens when the work life gets too personal. Submissions will be treated anonymously.
