Rep. Mark Foley Resigns after Writing E-Mails to Teenage Boy

Rep. Mark Foley had been considered a shoo-in for re-election to Congress this year. He has represented his Florida district, which includes West Palm Beach, since 1994 and has received dozens of awards from many national organizations and political organizations for his efforts to control federal spending, his support of legislation to provide tax relief to Americans, and his service to youth and the community.

On Friday, Foley tendered his resignation from Congress, effective immediately, as a result of questions about e-mails he wrote to a former page who was 16 years old at the time. In a statement issued by his office, Foley said, "I am deeply sorry and I apologize for letting down my family and the people of Florida I have had the privilege to represent." Foley did not refer to the e-mails and did not give any explanation for why the Congressman would give up his flourishing career as a well-liked, successful representative of the state of Florida.

The e-mails were posted on the website of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington after ABC News reported a story about the e-mails. CREW asked the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to investigate the exchange Foley had with the boy, who served as a page last summer for Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-La.

"The House of Representatives has an obligation to protect the teenagers who come to Congress to learn about the legislative process," the group wrote to the committee, saying that they "must investigate any allegation that a page has been subjected to sexual advances by members of the House."

The correspondence between Foley and the boy took place last August, after the boy handed a written thank you note to Foley before his return to Louisiana. According to the boy, Foley, who is single, asked him for his e-mail address and then wrote to him. His notes asked how old he was, what he wanted for his birthday, and how he was doing after the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina. He also asked the boy to e-mail him a picture. The notes were sent from Foley’s personal e-mail account.

In some of his e-mails, Foley wrote, "I am back in Florida now...its nice here...been raining today...it sounds like you will have some fun over the next few weeks...how old are you now?" and "how are you weathering the hurricane...are you safe...send me an email pic of you as well." What the boy wrote to Foley has not been made available. But the e-mails came to light when the boy wrote to a colleague in the office of Rep. Alexander and told him about the e-mails, saying, "This freaked me out." The boy said he thought Foley’s request for a photo was "sick." In one note, Foley said that he had also written to another page. "He’s such a nice guy," Foley said of the other boy, "…acts much older than his age…and he’s in really great shape…I am just finished riding my bike on a 25 mile journey now heading to the gym...whats school like for you this year?"

The St. Petersburg Times interviewed the boy last November, at which time the boy said, "I thought it was very inappropriate. After the one about the picture, I decided to stop e-mailing him back." The Times didn’t print their exchange with the boy until Friday, the day Foley resigned.

Foley’s opponent in this fall’s election, Democrat Tim Mahoney, has called for an investigation. Foley campaign aides had previously acknowledged that the Congressman did e-mail the boy five times, but had said that there was nothing in appropriate about the exchange. The campaign for Mahoney said that it did not release the e-mails and will not make them part of the campaign. But a statement released by Mahoney spokesman Jessica Santillo refers to the boy as an "alleged victim." However, Santillo’s statement said, "The seriousness of these allegations goes far beyond the tit for tat of a political campaign. This is a matter for the appropriate authorities to investigate. I believe Mr. Foley deserves the benefit of the doubt until these allegations are proven true or false."

Jason Kello, a spokesman for Foley, disputed the claim that the e-mails weren’t distributed by Mahoney’s campaign officials. "They’ve been shopping this around to reporters for weeks now. They want a headline and that’s it. It’s a political smear campaign of the worst kind." Kello says that Foley uses his personal e-mail account to communicate with a host of people including Gov. Jeb Bush, and his notes to the boy were nonchalant and casual. "They have taken these e-mails out of context in order to smear a good man."

However, ABC News reported Friday that Foley also participated in series of sexually explicit instant messages with current and former pages, all male. ABC said that Foley wrote to one of them, "Do I make you a little horny?" And another message said, ""You in your boxers, too? ... Well, strip down and get relaxed."

Ironically, as chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus, Foley had introduced legislation in July to protect children from being exploited by adults over the Internet.

"We track library books better than we do sexual predators," Foley has said.