Posted on 09/29/2006 12:56:16 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON - Rep. Mark Foley (news, bio, voting record), R-Fla., resigned from Congress on Friday, effective immediately, in the wake of questions about e-mails he wrote a former male page.
"I am deeply sorry and I apologize for letting down my family and the people of Florida I have had the privilege to represent," he said in a statement issued by his office.
The two-sentence statement did not refer to the e-mails and gave no reason for Foley's decision to abruptly abandon a flourishing career in Congress.
Foley, 52, had been a shoo-in for a new term until the e-mail correspondence surfaced in recent days.
His resignation comes less than six weeks before the elections. It was not clear how Republicans would fill his spot on the November ballot.
Campaign aides had previously acknowledged that the Republican congressman e-mailed the former Capitol page five times, but had said there was nothing inappropriate about the exchange. The page was 16 at the time of the e-mail correspondence.
It was not clear what prompted Foley to abruptly decide to give up a successful career in the House.
Foley, who represents an area around Palm Beach County, e-mailed the page in August 2005. The page had worked for Rep. Rodney Alexander (news, bio, voting record), R-La., and Foley asked him 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.
Foley's aides initially blamed Democratic rival Tim Mahoney and Democrats with attempting to smear the congressman before the election.
The e-mails were posted Friday on Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington's Web site after ABC News reported their existence. The group asked the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to investigate the exchange Foley had with the boy, who served as a page for Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-La.
"The House of Representatives has an obligation to protect the teenagers who come to Congress to learn about the legislative process," the group wrote, adding that the committee, "must investigate any allegation that a page has been subjected to sexual advances by members of the House."
... wonder how many pages will be in his book?
What apparently changed is that other former pages have come forward with sexually explicit chats from AOL that the Congressman engaged in.
A "Log Cabin" congressman bites the dust.
Barney Franks will bend over to be fair to this Repugnant Congressman.
Yeah, I like that idea.
Sounds like a good exit strategy...;-)
Like Alcee Hastings once said, "Don't judge people..."
Ooooh. Hang him, then.
and Turkish prisons......
I thought Foley was smart....but sexually explicit emails to a kid like that...just TOO STUPID.
There's a lot that's curious about all this. I wonder how many Congressmen this particular page handed notes to as he left. I also wonder if this page was involved in the IM messages or was it just the emails. If all of this happened in the summer of 2005, why weren't we hearing about it a year ago?
He was a Republican but certainly not a conservative. I won't stand by this guy. He had it coming.
Not necessarily. Depends on the quality of the evidence. Anyone can manufacture a text file and claim it represents an AOL chat. Not that anyone would do that to a Republican facing re-election. However, his quick resignation may be indicative of even more that he's hoping to keep secret by leaving now. Pedophiles usually cast quite a wide net.
Agreed. Remember Barney Frank.
I agree, it is quite interesting that the MSM plays up the party affiliation, but not the observation that this guy is a queer!
Actually Oprah is on the warpath against perverts, She probably would like to see this fool behind bars...
(She was sexually abused as a child IIRC)
"What's Barney Franks position on this?
I afraid of the answer."
They both have that twisted mouth so common in male homosexuals. Barney's is one of the worst I've ever seen.
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