Top aide sits before page ethics panel

[Ron Burgundy]

AP - The House ethics committee Monday questioned Speaker Dennis Hastert's top aide, a crucial witness in determining whether Hastert's office knew at least three years ago of Rep. Mark Foley (news, bio, voting record)'s come-ons to male pages.

The closed-door testimony by Hastert chief of staff Scott Palmer could help determine who is telling the truth about when the speaker's office learned of Foley's conduct. Hastert has said it was in the fall of 2005.

The speaker has a lot riding on the outcome. He has fended off calls for his resignation with statements that his staff acted properly after the 2005 notification, and quickly had a lawmaker and the House chief clerk confront the Florida Republican.

Hastert said he didn't learn about Foley until late September, when the scandal became public and Foley resigned.

The speaker's timeline could be shattered if the committee believes former Foley chief of staff Kirk Fordham, who already has testified before the ethics panel. Fordham has said publicly that he told Palmer about Foley in 2002 or 2003, and subsequently learned that Palmer spoke with Foley on the subject.

"What Kirk Fordham said did not happen," Palmer said weeks ago in his lone public statement on the matter.

Hastert's version, issued as an internal report, said his staff learned in the fall of 2005 that Foley had sent overly friendly e-mails to a former Louisiana page. The report said the staff did not see the texts of the e-mails, which asked about the 16-year-old's birthday and requested a picture.

The report said the speaker's office contacted then-chief clerk Jeff Trandahl, who went to confront Foley with Rep. John Shimkus (news, bio, voting record), R-Ill. and chairman of the board that oversees the page program. They ordered Foley to immediately stop communicating with the youngster.

The report added that nobody in Hastert's office knew, until the messages became public, that Foley also had sent sexually explicit instant messages to other former pages.

Ironically, the internal report did not mention any role played by Palmer, despite his status as Hastert's top assistant.

The speaker has left himself one major escape route, publicly pledging to fire any of his staff members who were found to have covered up knowledge of Foley's conduct.

Hastert also has said he doesn't recall discussing Foley's conduct with Rep. Tom Reynolds, R-N.Y., the House Republican campaign chairman; or Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, both of whom said they told Hastert about Foley earlier this year.

Boehner testified before the committee last week and Reynolds was expected to be questioned Tuesday.

Before Palmer testified, Reynolds' top political aide, Sally Vastola, appeared before the committee as it began a third week of closed-door testimony. Vastola is executive director of the National Republican Congressional Committee and a longtime top aide to Reynolds.

Vastola's testimony could touch on how Reynolds reacted when learning of problems with Foley's behavior toward pages and with whom Reynolds may have shared the information.

Testimony from Hastert's aides would go a long way toward wrapping up the interviews required for the panel to make its findings, though it's unclear whether the panel will have enough time to issue a report before Election Day.

The committee, evenly divided between the parties, could issue an interim report by Election Day.