Indictment Taints Former Speaker Dennis Hastert’s ‘Clean as a Whistle’ Reputation
Via NBC News
The indictment of Dennis Hastert, the former House speaker, on charges that he tried to conceal cash withdrawals to keep “prior misconduct” secret stunned some political allies.
Republicans elevated Hastert from obscurity when they gave him the job in 1999, after Rep. Newt Gingrich resigned under pressure and his would-be replacement, Rep. Bob Livingston of Louisiana, resigned his own seat after admitting an affair.
“Hastert got the job because he was supposed to be clean as a whistle,” said Sean Theriault, a professor in the Department of Government of the University of Texas at Austin. “In the aftermath of Gingrich and then the Livingston fiasco, the Republicans turned to Hastert because he was full of integrity.”
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