Rachel Maddow: John Ensign Did Have Contact With Doug Hampton on Lobbying Matters
By Heather Thursday Oct 08, 2009 11:00am
From The Rachel Maddow Show Oct. 7, 2009. Yet another shoe drops on Sen. John Ensign. We just had the news on Tom Coburn apparently negotiating bribes for Sen. Ensign, and now this.
MADDOW: We begin with a follow up to Sen. John Ensign’s failed attempt to avoid the media at all costs. You know that Sen. Ensign revealed back in June that he had had an affair with a campaign staffer. A campaign staffer who was married to a man named Doug Hampton. Doug Hampton worked in Sen. Ensign’s senate office. Here was the failed media avoidance indecent.
[…]
“I never talked to Doug Hampton about any of that stuff.” The question was Sen. Ensign did you ever meet with Doug Hampton after you got him a lobbying job. “No, I never met with Doug Hampton about any of that stuff.”
What you just saw was CNN’s Dana Bash and her producer confronting John Ensign outside his office in Washington D.C. yesterday. They’re trying to ask the senator this. What was your involvement with Doug Hampton after you convinced companies to hire him as a lobbyist? It’s an important question because former staffers are required by law to wait a year before lobbying their old bosses.
And the answer that Ensign gave in this interview was zilch, nada, none. He said he had no contact with Doug Hampton on any lobbying matters.
[…]
“I never met with him on any of that lobbying stuff.” Well the New York Times today looked into the veracity of this statement and they found an uh-oh.
Interviews and documents, however, show that Mr. Ensign had lunch in the Senate dining room in March with Mr. Hampton and executives from Allegiant Air to discuss aviation issues. That lunch took place on the same day that the airline executives, in a meeting arranged by Mr. Ensign, spoke with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood about a dispute with a foreign carrier and other issues.
Allegiant Air being one of Mr. Hampton’s clients on whose behalf he lobbied.
BASH: Is there anything else that you... are you considering resigning?
ENSIGN: I am focused on doing my work. I'm going to continue to focus on doing my work.
MADDOW: And so too will everyone else senator-- We will all be focusing on your work. Particularly the work we now think you did with your mistress’ husband/former staffer/illegal lobbyist.
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Got into government for the MONEY!!
republicanism is a mental illness!
Yes. Yes it is.
Birthers
Tea baggers
Bottom scum
Republicans
Boaner sandwiches
Busch debacles
C-Street cults
Gun slingers
Liars
Frauds
Felons
War mongers
OK, i'll stop for now but the list is really much, much longer. If you are a conservative, check it out some time.
He surely did not have contact with Mr. Hampton the way he had contact with Mrs. Hampton. It was uglies, but they were not bumping.
You sure?
Ensign was pretty much in the clear (only Democrats need worry about sex scandals); now, not so much. Oops.
Stay on this clown Rachel! While that Dick Joe Scarborough was asking this morning why Charlie Rangel doesn't resign, he never even mentioned Ensign who's being investigate by the FBI. As I Dem I can tell you that I don't like Rangel either but, he's been cleared 3 times already and the Republicans are just pissed because the Dems are pulling something they would do and getting away with it. Republicans SUCK!
This lying scum and trash even when confronted with the evidence still try to WESAL their way out. Christ whem is this scum and trash going to be removed.
I can understand why he needs to focus on his work now, he probably got way behind on his work when he was focusing on Mrs. Hampton's behind.
I would have guessed he was into her snarky bits, myself. Many a furtive fromming started with that attraction.
He's such a smug weasel that I doubt he even remembers what she looks like. He was probably looking into a mirror to see himself the whole time. He most likely thought she was lucky to have a fromming stud like him in her life. Her husband on the other hand probably played the part of the door mat at the home.
He was lying by the front door.
While Ensign had some scratch marks on his back, Mr. Hampton had footprints on his.
In the few months that I've learned of Mr. Ensign's personality and how mommy and daddy are still having to bail him out, I suspect Ms. Hampton did most of the work while Mr. Ensign just sat on his ass or laid on his back.
to focus on doing my work."
He has his staff hard on the task ahead.
I believe it would be more accurate to say his staff was hard on the task behind.
his staff is small and he keeps the tasks close at hand.
Just how is it that you two know so much about Ensign's staff, its workload and orientation? Are you Vegas insiders?
So it appears he did. Now what? Wait for an interminable amount of time for someone to charge him? This should be his 'waterloo' but other than Rachel and maybe KO, who is going to do anything? There is no longer any law that can't be broken with impunity especially if you're a republican't.
Didya' really think the guy that slept with his staffer's wife is going to give a crap about whether he broke the law or resign because of it? He's a republican't; his moral compass points straight to hell!
His moral compass may point straight to hell but his little soldier's compass has been pointing in another direction.
viagra. What strays in Vegas gets paid off in Vegas.
And don't get me started on his employee compassation plan.
Call the Chamber of Commerce in Vegas, I think they'll like that better than their old slogan.
What happens in Vegas has a half life of thousands of years.
After all this, Ensign will probably get a promotion from all his brothers on K Street. I mean screw some guys wife, get your parents to pay her off and find a job for her husband even though that's against the law. I would guess all that should be worth at least three or four merit badges.
If he was Catholic it would have COST him at least three Hail Marys
and Four Our Fathers.
I think I'll leave the Catholics alone in this one because they have had to deal with their own problems. Here's what Ensign needs to do. He needs to go to that site where they are writing liberal stuff out of the Bible and just sketch in some stuff about loving your mistress and her husband as you love your self. That way, case closed. As for the legal problems, let those without lobbying problems cast the first stone.
the right was hoping they could use gov. stanford (r) of s. carolina to take the heat for ensign. personally, i hope there's no letting up on the born again hypocrite.
We should have a lottery for when Ensign resigns. I pick November 20, 2009.
He may decide he wants to spend as much time with his family as he did with the Hampton family, but I doubt he's going anywhere.
Looks like mommy and daddy are going to have to write some more checks.
want to know who John Ensign had contact with the local health authorities would be a good place to start. It's their job to deal with infectious diseases.
Republicans view themselves as the true welders of
power, the real movers, shockers and awers. I hope
their candidates of presidential timber will be picked
off one by one and I will yell t-i-m-b-e-r.
There is only one problem with that, it leaves Romney as
a VP candidate to Patraeus' assuming full recovery from prostate cancer, that is.
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