• If you are having problems logging in please use the Contact Us in the lower right hand corner of the forum page for assistance.

Ranchers.net

Foley Scandal Investigations Heating Up Last Edited: Friday, 06 Oct 2006, 1:16 PM MDT
Created: Friday, 06 Oct 2006, 1:16 PM MDT

By ANDREW TAYLOR
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON -- House Speaker Dennis Hastert is getting backup from President Bush and other Republican luminaries, while one of the party's Senate candidates calls for him to resign over the congressional page cybersex scandal.
"He is the head of that institution and this happened on his watch," Jill Hazelbaker, spokeswoman for New Jersey GOP Senate candidate Tom Kean Jr., said Friday.

But former Secretary of State James Baker III, an elder statesmen of the party, said of Hastert: "He really ought not be a sacrificial lamb."

President Bush called Hastert late Thursday to reassure him amid allegations that the House speaker did not do enough to protect the teenage House pages from former Rep. Mark Foley's advances.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., issued a statement supporting Hastert Thursday night. And Bush's father, the former President Bush, spoke up for him during an ABC News interview.

The boost comes amid a week of wavering support from House Republicans in the wake of revelations that Foley, R-Fla., had been sending inappropriate e-mails to teenage pages for years.

Hastert had blamed Democrats for the election-season revelations, but on Thursday abruptly changed course and took responsibility for the matter.
Top