CNN: Fordham arranged meeting between Foley, Hastert aide Scott Palmer

[DeepModem Mom]

Ex-aide testifies to ethics panel about Foley
October 12, 2006


Ex-aide Kirk Fordham testified before the House Ethics Committee Thursday in the Mark Foley congressional page scandal.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Ex-congressional aide Kirk Fordham emerged from a House ethics committee hearing after more than four hours of sworn testimony Thursday in the scandal surrounding former Rep. Mark Foley's inappropriate contacts with teenage pages.

Fordham, once Foley's chief of staff, went before the ethics committee's investigative panel early Thursday afternoon and remained there until well after 5 p.m....A source familiar with Fordham's account said the ex-aide would testify that he warned House Speaker Dennis Hastert's office years ago about complaints regarding Foley's behavior around the teenage messengers who work on Capitol Hill -- including a report that the disgraced congressman showed up drunk at the congressional page dormitory....

***

...CNN was told by two sources familiar with Fordham's account and a third, independent source that Fordham maintains he arranged a meeting between Foley and Hastert's chief of staff, Scott Palmer, about that report and accounts of other behavior Fordham found troubling.

Palmer has denied Fordham's account, insisting in a statement last week that "What Kirk Fordham said did not happen." He has made no further public comment, but Hastert's office issued a brief statement after Fordham's testimony.

Fordham's version of the story contradicts statements by other members of the House leadership. Hastert's office said it first learned about non-explicit but "overly friendly" e-mails between Foley and a Louisiana teen who had served as a page earlier that year, and did not know about the sexually explicit instant messages that triggered Foley's resignation until September 29, when the congressman abruptly resigned....

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/10/12/foley.fallout/index.html

[Gabi Hayes]

1. so, who you going to believe, John Dean or Richard Nixon?

he's got to have SOME proof of what he said to them.....

[DeepModem Mom]

2. Refresh my memory -- Have we heard before that Palmer and Foley met? nt

[karlrschneider]

3. It's easy to imagine Palmer's motive for lying...but what would Fordham's

be?