Overseers of the
House of Representatives' program for teenage assistants
this week discussed a camping trip that Republican
congressman Jim Kolbe of Arizona took with two former
interns and others in 1996--an outing now under
review by the Justice Department, a congressional source
said Tuesday.
The overseers,
consisting of three lawmakers and two senior House
officials, did not have any new information beyond recent
news stories on the Kolbe trip. Those stories said
that in addition to the former interns--known as
pages--members of his staff and National Park Service
officials went along. The source is familiar with the
discussions but is not authorized to speak publicly on
the matter.
Recent polls show
that the Kolbe camping trip coupled with the recent
scandal involving gay former congressman Mark
Foley--who resigned over explicit Internet
messages to former male pages--have hurt the
chances that the GOP will retain control over the Senate and
the House in the November 7 election. Democrats need
to pick up 15 seats in the House of Representatives
and six in the Senate to gain majorities. All 435
House seats and 33 of the 100 Senate seats are up for a
vote.
The Kolbe trip
was discussed in a conference call Monday. It shows that
the people responsible for the page program are casting a
wider net following the revelations about Foley. The
meeting was first revealed Monday by the lone Democrat
on the page board, Rep. Dale Kildee, who declined to
say which lawmakers were discussed.
Meanwhile, the
House Ethics Committee on Tuesday continued investigating
the Foley matter. Investigators, pressing ahead with
closed-door interviews, questioned Paula Nowakowski,
chief of staff for House majority leader John Boehner.
Kolbe took the
former pages as well as staff members and National Park
Service officials on a holiday rafting trip in the Grand
Canyon in 1996, his spokeswoman Korenna Cline said
last week. A federal law enforcement official said
last week that an allegation related to the trip was given
to the U.S. attorney's office in Phoenix. It was not
immediately clear whether it concerned any contention
of improper activity by the retiring Kolbe, the only
openly gay Republican in Congress.
The official
described the inquiry as preliminary and as far narrower in
scope than the federal investigation of Foley, who resigned
September 29. Foley's resignation touched off a wave
of investigations and allegations that House
Republican leaders were aware of his behavior before the
scandal broke.
A second law
enforcement official said the 1996 Kolbe trip may be too old
to investigate as a criminal matter. Both officials spoke on
condition of anonymity because of the continuing
investigation. A Justice Department spokeswoman
declined comment. (AP)
