50 Fun Facts About US Political Scandals

South Carolina governor Mark Sanford was said to be hiking the Appalachian Trail when he was really in which country?

Argentina was where Sanford had gone to see a woman he was having an affair with, and "hiking the Appalachian Trail" became American slang for a sex scandal.

FBI agents probing Louisiana congressman William Jefferson for bribery found $90,000 in cash hidden where in his home?

In his freezer was where agents found the cash, and Jefferson's 13-year prison term was the longest ever handed to a congressman at the time.

Which cocker spaniel, a gift Richard Nixon vowed to keep, gave its name to his 1952 speech defending a campaign fund?

Checkers was named by Nixon's six-year-old daughter Tricia, and the televised speech drew millions of supportive telegrams and calls that kept him on Eisenhower's ticket.

Which senior FBI official revealed in 2005 that he had been Deep Throat, the secret source in the Watergate scandal?

Mark Felt kept the secret for more than 30 years, and admitted it at 91 only after his daughter persuaded him to speak before he died.

Which White House intern's affair with Bill Clinton led to his impeachment by the House of Representatives?

Monica Lewinsky gave investigators a blue dress whose DNA evidence showed the president's sworn denials were false, though the Senate later acquitted him.

Which Illinois governor was removed from office after allegedly trying to sell Barack Obama's vacated Senate seat?

Rod Blagojevich was recorded on federal wiretaps discussing the seat, and the Illinois Senate removed him from office in January 2009.

Which 1920s scandal saw President Harding's Interior Secretary jailed for taking bribes to lease navy oil reserves?

Teapot Dome was regarded as the most sensational scandal in American politics until Watergate, yet nobody was ever convicted of paying the bribes.

Investigators searching New Jersey senator Bob Menendez's home in a bribery case found cash and which other valuables?

Gold bars worth more than $100,000 turned up beside $480,000 in cash, and Menendez resigned from the Senate after a jury convicted him in 2024.

Which senator pleaded guilty to leaving the scene after his car went off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island in 1969?

Ted Kennedy received a two-month suspended sentence, and the death of his passenger Mary Jo Kopechne was later said to have undermined his chances of ever becoming president.

Aides to which New Jersey governor closed bridge lanes in Fort Lee in 2013, in the traffic scandal dubbed Bridgegate?

Chris Christie saw his presidential hopes fade over the closures, though the Supreme Court unanimously overturned his aides' convictions in 2020.

Which newspaper's reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, guided by a secret source, exposed the Watergate cover-up?

The Washington Post kept two young reporters on what looked like a local burglary, while most other papers at first gave the story negligible coverage.

Which president pardoned Richard Nixon for any Watergate crimes, explaining the decision in a televised address?

Gerald Ford later carried in his wallet part of a Supreme Court ruling which said that accepting a pardon carries a confession of guilt.

Which vice president resigned in 1973 and pleaded no contest to tax evasion while Watergate engulfed the White House?

Spiro Agnew had taken kickbacks from contractors as governor of Maryland, a scandal separate from Watergate, and was only the second vice president ever to resign.

Which president's administration secretly sold arms to Iran and used the proceeds to fund Contra rebels in Nicaragua?

Ronald Reagan later told the nation on television that he took full responsibility, admitting the Iran opening had deteriorated into trading arms for hostages.

Which Marine officer on the National Security Council staff was convicted, then cleared, over the Iran–Contra affair?

Oliver North admitted shredding documents, and his three felony convictions were thrown out because his immunized testimony to Congress may have tainted the trial.

Which independent counsel's 1998 report to Congress accused Bill Clinton of lying under oath in a harassment lawsuit?

Kenneth Starr had been appointed in 1994 to examine the Clintons' old financial dealings in Arkansas, and his inquiry widened for four years before it reached the affair.

Which New York governor, once called the Sheriff of Wall Street, resigned in 2008 after being named as Client 9?

Eliot Spitzer had prosecuted prostitution rings himself, so being exposed as a customer of one brought charges of hypocrisy and threats of impeachment.

Which Democratic front-runner quit the 1988 presidential race after reports of an affair with model Donna Rice?

Gary Hart was trailed by Miami Herald reporters who staked out his townhouse, a level of scrutiny of a candidate's private life that was noted as unprecedented at the time.

Donald Trump's first impeachment centered on aid he withheld from which country while seeking a probe of Joe Biden?

Ukraine had a $400 million aid package from Congress held up and later released, and the Senate acquitted Trump on both articles in February 2020.

Which Wisconsin senator was censured by the Senate in 1954 after televised hearings into his feud with the Army?

Joseph McCarthy lost the censure vote 67–22, which made the communist-hunting senator one of the few ever disciplined that way by his colleagues.

Which nickname was given to the 1973 evening when Richard Nixon forced out special prosecutor Archibald Cox?

Saturday Night Massacre describes the attorney general and his deputy both resigning rather than fire Cox, which left Solicitor General Robert Bork to do it.

The 1972 Watergate burglars were caught planting listening devices in the headquarters of which organization?

Democratic National Committee offices in the Watergate complex were the target, and the men caught inside were operatives tied to Nixon's own re-election campaign.

Which analyst who leaked the Pentagon Papers had his psychiatrist's office burgled by Nixon's White House Plumbers?

Daniel Ellsberg's file held nothing embarrassing, so the burglars left it on the floor, and the government's misconduct later got every charge against him dismissed.

Which failed Arkansas land venture co-owned by Bill and Hillary Clinton led to a 1990s independent counsel inquiry?

Whitewater never brought a prosecution of either Clinton, but their business partners Jim and Susan McDougal were among fifteen people convicted of financial crimes.

Which law professor testified in televised 1991 hearings that court nominee Clarence Thomas had sexually harassed her?

Anita Hill had worked under Thomas at two federal agencies, and after extensive debate the Senate still confirmed him by 52 votes to 48.

Which former personal lawyer to Donald Trump pleaded guilty in 2018 to campaign-finance crimes over hush money?

Michael Cohen had set up a Delaware shell company to pay adult-film actress Stormy Daniels $130,000 in late 2016.

Which former FBI director led the special counsel probe into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election?

Robert Mueller's report did not establish that the Trump campaign conspired with Russia, but on obstruction of justice it said it did not exonerate the president.

Which New York congressman was expelled from the House in 2023 after an ethics investigation and a federal indictment?

George Santos was the first member expelled without a prior criminal conviction or support for the Confederacy, and only the sixth expelled in the history of the House.

A 2005 tape of Donald Trump talking with host Billy Bush, leaked before the 2016 election, came from which TV show?

Access Hollywood recorded the pair in a studio parking lot as Trump arrived to appear in a soap opera, and the tape surfaced one month before the vote.

Which future presidential nominee was one of the Keating Five senators accused of improperly aiding a failing lender?

John McCain was cleared of acting improperly but criticized for poor judgment, and in 2002 he put his name to the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law.

Which FBI sting used agents posing as Arab sheikhs to catch members of Congress taking bribes on videotape?

Abscam was the first time in American history that officials were secretly videotaped accepting bribes, and it convicted one senator and six House members.

Which Interior Secretary became the first former cabinet officer jailed for misconduct in office, over oil bribes?

Albert B. Fall, a former senator from New Mexico, was sentenced to a year in prison and came out in financially reduced circumstances.

Which sham construction company overbilled the Union Pacific Railroad and bribed congressmen with discounted stock?

Crédit Mobilier billed $94 million for a line that cost about $50 million to build, and the scandal nearly bankrupted the railroad it was meant to serve.

Which 1875 tax-fraud scandal led to the indictment of Orville Babcock, private secretary to President Ulysses Grant?

Whiskey Ring distillers and revenue agents had been pocketing liquor taxes, and Grant's own Justice Department prosecuted members of his party for it.

Which New York Democratic political machine did William "Boss" Tweed lead while his ring plundered the city treasury?

Tammany Hall kept voters loyal through the city jobs Tweed could hand out, and long shared his old fire company's symbol, a snarling Bengal tiger.

Which Harper's Weekly cartoonist's drawings were instrumental in bringing down New York's corrupt Tweed Ring?

Thomas Nast so alarmed Tweed that an emissary offered him a bribe to go and study art in Europe, and he bargained the offer up to $500,000 before refusing it.

Which Treasury Secretary published a pamphlet admitting an affair with Maria Reynolds to rebut corruption charges?

Alexander Hamilton had paid her husband over $1,300 in hush money, about a third of his yearly income, in the first major sex scandal in American politics.

Which former vice president was tried for treason in 1807 over an alleged plot in the American West?

Aaron Burr was arrested on Thomas Jefferson's orders and acquitted, but the affair destroyed what was left of his political career.

Which president's cabinet was torn apart by the Petticoat affair, in which cabinet wives shunned Peggy Eaton?

Andrew Jackson was a long-time friend of Peggy's husband, his Secretary of War, and the feud helped push his vice president into the first such resignation in American history.

Which Secretary of War did Andrew Johnson try to remove, the act that got Johnson impeached in 1868?

Edwin Stanton was protected by a law Congress had passed over Johnson's veto, and the Senate fell a single vote short of removing the president.

Agents of which country's foreign minister demanded bribes from John Adams's envoys in the XYZ Affair?

France and the United States slid into the undeclared Quasi-War after the offended envoys left without ever holding formal talks.

Which chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney was convicted of perjury in the Valerie Plame CIA leak case?

Scooter Libby had his 30-month prison sentence commuted by George W. Bush, and Donald Trump later granted him a full pardon.

Which lobbyist pleaded guilty in 2006 to fraud and conspiracy over his work for Native American tribes seeking casinos?

Jack Abramoff and his partners had charged the tribes an estimated $85 million in fees, and Kevin Spacey later played him in the film Casino Jack.

Which former vice-presidential nominee admitted fathering a child with Rielle Hunter, a filmmaker on his 2008 campaign?

John Edwards admitted the affair in 2008 but kept denying he was the father, and only acknowledged his daughter in a statement in January 2010.

Which CIA director and retired four-star general resigned in 2012 after the FBI found his affair with his biographer?

David Petraeus was exposed when the FBI looked into a cyberstalking complaint and traced it to Paula Broadwell, the Army reservist he had chosen to write his life story.

Which self-described country lawyer chaired the Senate select committee that investigated Watergate in 1973?

Sam Ervin told folksy stories in a Southern drawl, but he had studied law at Harvard, and his panel became popularly known as the Ervin Committee.

President Jimmy Carter's brother Billy registered as a foreign agent of which country after taking a $220,000 loan?

Libya had hosted Billy Carter on three visits, and the Senate hearing into alleged influence peddling that followed was named Billygate by the press.

Which mayor of the District of Columbia was videotaped smoking crack cocaine in a 1990 FBI sting operation?

Marion Barry was arrested at the Vista International Hotel with a former girlfriend, yet voters elected him mayor again in 1994.

Which Missouri senator was dropped as George McGovern's 1972 running mate after revealing past electroshock therapy?

Thomas Eagleton withdrew at McGovern's request less than three weeks after his nomination, yet Missouri re-elected him to the Senate two years later with 60% of the vote.

Which House Ways and Means chairman's career collapsed after two public incidents with stripper Fanne Foxe in 1974?

Wilbur Mills still won re-election with more than 59% of the vote after the first incident, in which Foxe leapt from his car into the Tidal Basin.