US Political Scandals
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50 free US Political Scandals trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
American politics has produced scandals for almost as long as it has held elections. Some began with a break-in or a bribe, others with a love affair or a careless lie, and many ended careers that had looked unstoppable. The details are often stranger than fiction: hidden cash, secret tapes, sting operations and excuses that turned into punchlines. This quiz covers more than two centuries of misbehavior, from the founding era and the Gilded Age through Watergate, Iran–Contra, presidential impeachments and the headline cases of recent years. You will meet presidents, senators, governors, mayors and lobbyists, along with the reporters, prosecutors and whistleblowers who exposed them. It suits history buffs, civics classes, pub quiz hosts and anyone who follows the news. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you learn what happened next as well as who was caught.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01South Carolina governor Mark Sanford was said to be hiking the Appalachian Trail when he was really in which country?
Argentina
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.
Q 02FBI agents probing Louisiana congressman William Jefferson for bribery found $90,000 in cash hidden where in his home?
In his freezer
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.
Q 03Which cocker spaniel, a gift Richard Nixon vowed to keep, gave its name to his 1952 speech defending a campaign fund?
Checkers
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.
Q 04Which senior FBI official revealed in 2005 that he had been Deep Throat, the secret source in the Watergate scandal?
Mark Felt
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.
Q 05Which White House intern's affair with Bill Clinton led to his impeachment by the House of Representatives?
Monica Lewinsky
Monica Lewinsky gave investigators a blue dress whose DNA evidence showed the president's sworn denials were false, though the Senate later acquitted him.
Q 06Which Illinois governor was removed from office after allegedly trying to sell Barack Obama's vacated Senate seat?
Rod Blagojevich
Rod Blagojevich was recorded on federal wiretaps discussing the seat, and the Illinois Senate removed him from office in January 2009.
Q 07Which 1920s scandal saw President Harding's Interior Secretary jailed for taking bribes to lease navy oil reserves?
Teapot Dome
Teapot Dome was regarded as the most sensational scandal in American politics until Watergate, yet nobody was ever convicted of paying the bribes.
Q 08Investigators searching New Jersey senator Bob Menendez's home in a bribery case found cash and which other valuables?
Gold bars
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.
Q 09Which senator pleaded guilty to leaving the scene after his car went off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island in 1969?
Ted Kennedy
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.
Q 10Aides to which New Jersey governor closed bridge lanes in Fort Lee in 2013, in the traffic scandal dubbed Bridgegate?
Chris Christie
Chris Christie saw his presidential hopes fade over the closures, though the Supreme Court unanimously overturned his aides' convictions in 2020.
Q 11Which newspaper's reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, guided by a secret source, exposed the Watergate cover-up?
The Washington Post
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.
Q 12Which president pardoned Richard Nixon for any Watergate crimes, explaining the decision in a televised address?
Gerald Ford
Gerald Ford later carried in his wallet part of a Supreme Court ruling which said that accepting a pardon carries a confession of guilt.
Q 13Which vice president resigned in 1973 and pleaded no contest to tax evasion while Watergate engulfed the White House?
Spiro Agnew
Q 21Which nickname was given to the 1973 evening when Richard Nixon forced out special prosecutor Archibald Cox?
Saturday Night Massacre
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.
Q 22The 1972 Watergate burglars were caught planting listening devices in the headquarters of which organization?
Democratic National Committee
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.
Q 23Which analyst who leaked the Pentagon Papers had his psychiatrist's office burgled by Nixon's White House Plumbers?
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.
Q 14Which president's administration secretly sold arms to Iran and used the proceeds to fund Contra rebels in Nicaragua?
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan later told the nation on television that he took full responsibility, admitting the Iran opening had deteriorated into trading arms for hostages.
Q 15Which Marine officer on the National Security Council staff was convicted, then cleared, over the Iran–Contra affair?
Oliver North
Oliver North admitted shredding documents, and his three felony convictions were thrown out because his immunized testimony to Congress may have tainted the trial.
Q 16Which independent counsel's 1998 report to Congress accused Bill Clinton of lying under oath in a harassment lawsuit?
Kenneth Starr
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.
Q 17Which New York governor, once called the Sheriff of Wall Street, resigned in 2008 after being named as Client 9?
Eliot Spitzer
Eliot Spitzer had prosecuted prostitution rings himself, so being exposed as a customer of one brought charges of hypocrisy and threats of impeachment.
Q 18Which Democratic front-runner quit the 1988 presidential race after reports of an affair with model Donna Rice?
Gary Hart
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.
Q 19Donald Trump's first impeachment centered on aid he withheld from which country while seeking a probe of Joe Biden?
Ukraine
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.
Q 20Which Wisconsin senator was censured by the Senate in 1954 after televised hearings into his feud with the Army?
Joseph McCarthy
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.
Daniel Ellsberg
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.
Q 24Which failed Arkansas land venture co-owned by Bill and Hillary Clinton led to a 1990s independent counsel inquiry?
Whitewater
Whitewater never brought a prosecution of either Clinton, but their business partners Jim and Susan McDougal were among fifteen people convicted of financial crimes.
Q 25Which law professor testified in televised 1991 hearings that court nominee Clarence Thomas had sexually harassed her?
Anita Hill
Anita Hill had worked under Thomas at two federal agencies, and after extensive debate the Senate still confirmed him by 52 votes to 48.
Q 26Which former personal lawyer to Donald Trump pleaded guilty in 2018 to campaign-finance crimes over hush money?
Michael Cohen
Michael Cohen had set up a Delaware shell company to pay adult-film actress Stormy Daniels $130,000 in late 2016.
Q 27Which former FBI director led the special counsel probe into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election?
Robert Mueller
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.
Q 28Which New York congressman was expelled from the House in 2023 after an ethics investigation and a federal indictment?
George Santos
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.
Q 29A 2005 tape of Donald Trump talking with host Billy Bush, leaked before the 2016 election, came from which TV show?
Access Hollywood
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.
Q 30Which future presidential nominee was one of the Keating Five senators accused of improperly aiding a failing lender?
John McCain
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.