50 free Watergate trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Five men in business suits were arrested inside Democratic National Committee headquarters at 2 a.m. on June 17, 1972. Twenty-six months later Richard Nixon became the first U.S. president to resign. In between came the Plumbers, Operation Gemstone, hush money, a secret taping system, an 18-and-a-half-minute gap, the Saturday Night Massacre and a unanimous Supreme Court. These 50 questions cover the burglars and who sent them, the Washington Post's reporting and Deep Throat, the Ervin hearings, the fight over the tapes, the impeachment articles, the resignation and Ford's pardon, plus the legacy: -gate, "follow the money", the Presidential Records Act and the Frost interviews. Early rounds are for anyone who has seen All the President's Men; later rounds are for people who know who Alexander Butterfield is. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries before publishing.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01On what date in 1972 were the burglars caught inside DNC headquarters?
June 17
An earlier break-in on May 28 had succeeded; the June return trip was to fix a faulty bug.
Q 02The break-in was part of which covert campaign plan devised by Hunt and Liddy?
Operation Gemstone
Earlier Gemstone drafts included kidnapping protesters and a boat full of sex workers to entrap Democrats.
Q 03Alongside E. Howard Hunt, which former FBI agent led the burglary operation?
G. Gordon Liddy
Liddy refused to testify and served the longest sentence of anyone involved.
Q 04Bob Woodward's reporting partner at The Washington Post was whom?
Carl Bernstein
Both were novices; editor Barry Sussman paired them with veteran Alfred Lewis on day one.
Q 05What nickname did Post editor Howard Simons give Woodward's anonymous source?
Deep Throat
It referenced both his deep-background status and a 1972 pornographic film.
Q 06Which FBI official was Woodward's key anonymous source, later nicknamed by his editor?
Mark Felt
Passed over for director after Hoover's death, he leaked partly to undermine the man who got the job.
Q 07Which attorney general appointed Archibald Cox as special prosecutor?
Elliot Richardson
They agreed Cox could only be fired for "extraordinary improprieties", a promise that lasted five months.
Q 08Who, as acting attorney general, carried out Nixon's order to fire Cox?
Robert Bork
He considered resigning so as not to be seen as "a man who did the President's bidding to save my job".
Q 09Who replaced Cox as special prosecutor in November 1973?
Leon Jaworski
A former Nuremberg prosecutor, he was presumed sympathetic to the president and proved anything but.
Q 10On what date did Nixon's resignation take effect?
August 9, 1974
He announced it the evening before; Ford was sworn in at noon.
Q 11How many people in total were charged with crimes in connection with Watergate?
69
They included two cabinet members; most pleaded guilty or were convicted.
Q 12Which press secretary resigned in protest at the pardon of Nixon?
Jerald terHorst
The president's approval rating dropped 22 points after the pardon.
Q 13Hunt and Liddy's unit burgled the office of Lewis Fielding, whose psychiatrist?
Daniel Ellsberg
They were hunting for material to discredit the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers.
Q 14The White House "Special Investigations Unit" became known by what nickname?
Q 21How many hours of conversation did Nixon's secret taping system record?
3,432
It ran from February 1971 to July 1973 and was hidden even from his secretary.
Q 22Who revealed the existence of the Oval Office tapes to Senate investigators in July 1973?
Alexander Butterfield
Nixon's own counsel and Vice President Agnew urged him to destroy the tapes; he never did.
Q 23Which North Carolina senator chaired the Senate Watergate Committee?
Sam Ervin
Three in four American households watched the hearings, an average of 30 hours each.
The Plumbers
The name came from aide David Young's grandmother, who assumed leaks meant pipes.
Q 15Liddy privately dubbed the leak-plugging unit what, after a rumored Nazi SS group?
ODESSA
His later ideas included drugging Ellsberg with LSD at a Washington gala.
Q 16Before Watergate, Hunt had helped arrange a 1954 CIA coup in which country?
Guatemala
He also worked on the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, where he met the Cuban exiles he later recruited.
Q 17Which Cuban-born CIA veteran and Bay of Pigs figure led the team of burglars?
Bernard Barker
He had once served under the dictator Fulgencio Batista.
Q 18Which burglar was the only non-Cuban on the team, having once fought alongside Castro?
Frank Sturgis
He later fed Seymour Hersh the story that the burglars were receiving hush money.
Q 19Which security guard found the taped door and called the police?
Frank Wills
He played himself in the 1976 film All the President's Men.
Q 20The bugging targeted the office of which Democratic National Committee chairman?
Larry O'Brien
Liddy later claimed the aim was to learn what damaging material O'Brien held on Nixon's side.
Q 24Which White House counsel told Nixon there was "a cancer within" the presidency?
John Dean
Nixon asked him over 150 questions in the March 21, 1973 meeting, then fired him five weeks later.
Q 25Which former attorney general remains the highest-ranking US official ever imprisoned?
John Mitchell
At sentencing he joked it could have been worse: a life sentence with his wife Martha.
Q 26Martha Mitchell was forcibly restrained while trying to phone which UPI reporter?
Helen Thomas
She later told Thomas, "I'm black and blue. I'm a political prisoner."
Q 27The "smoking gun" tape, in which Nixon orders the CIA to block the FBI, dates from when?
June 23, 1972
Its release on August 5 extinguished Nixon's remaining support; he resigned four days later.
Q 28The 18-and-a-half-minute gap erased a conversation between Nixon and which aide?
H. R. Haldeman
Experts found it had been erased in five to nine separate segments using the hand keys.
Q 29Which secretary was blamed for accidentally erasing part of the tape?
Rose Mary Woods
Her explanation involved reaching for a phone while keeping a foot on the pedal, a pose she could not repeat.
Q 30Where was Nixon speaking when he declared "I am not a crook"?
Walt Disney World
He was addressing Associated Press editors at the Contemporary Resort on November 17, 1973.