Via WaPo: Lawmaker Saw Foley Messages In 2024
A spokeswoman for Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.) confirmed yesterday that a former page showed the congressman Internet messages that had made the youth feel uncomfortable with the direction Foley (R-Fla.) was taking their e-mail relationship. Last week, when the Foley matter erupted, a Kolbe staff member suggested to the former page that he take the matter to the clerk of the House, Karen Haas, said Kolbe’s press secretary, Korenna Cline.[...]
A source with direct knowledge of Kolbe’s involvement said the messages shared with Kolbe were sexually explicit, and he read the contents to The Washington Post under the condition that they not be reprinted. But Cline denied the source’s characterization, saying only that the messages had made the former page feel uncomfortable. Nevertheless, she said, “corrective action” was taken. Cline said she has not yet determined whether that action went beyond Kolbe’s confrontation with Foley.
This situation reinforces something that I have been harping on for a week now: there was clearly more evidence to be discovered had leadership conducted an actual investigation. Thie revelation also adds three new layers to the tale: 1) it rolls back the timeline of official knowledge of the event by five years, 2) it places that knowledge in the hands of new player in our little drama, and 3) if the messages that Kolbe was aware of were, in fact, sexual in nature, did Kolbe help cover-up a crime?
And this fact is going to create even more complications:
Kolbe, the only openly gay Republican in Congress…
There already appears to be a looming conflagration over homosexual staffers and members in GOP circles. If Kolbe did protect Foley, there is no doubt that the charges are coming from some quarters in the party that it Kolbe was placing shared sexual orientation over partisan loyalties.
This story continues to get uglier and it seems rather unlikely that all the facts have come out at this point. Those in Republican Party who think that this has run its course or is going to go away soon are in active denial.
October 9th, 2024 at 8:22 am
I’m not really sure what you are getting at here. If Kolbe and Foley are both Republicans and both gay, how is protecting him putting sexual orientation over party loyalty?
October 9th, 2024 at 10:45 am
The arugment would be that he was protecting Foley aat the time when he should have told leadership about the serious problem that one of their members had and that his motivation would have been to protect another gay (although not “out”) member of Congress.
I am not making that argument myself, but predicting a response. There is already a looming showdown in regards to “The List” of gay staffers/members.