To: Congressional pages
From: Mark Foley
Re: The former Florida Representative's infamous e-mails and instant messages to congressional pages pack perhaps the greatest ick factor of all the notes on this list. Over a period of years, Foley carried on racy cyber-conversations with teenage boys, including asking about sex and masturbation. Foley maintains that he did nothing illegal, and investigations by the FBI and Florida officials wrapped up without any criminal charges. Nonetheless, Foley — who had made a name as an advocate for cracking down on sexual predators and helped push through a law to protect children on the Internet — resigned in disgrace in 2006. He was mum on the scandal for two years. In 2008 he resurfaced, dishing to the Associated Press about his fall from grace. "In public life, you dream of the day they'll name a hospital after you, or a bridge or a post office," Foley said. "If I had a post office named after me today, they'd probably return to sender." If only the teens could have done the same with those e-mails.
Excerpt: "how are you weathering the hurricane...are you safe...send me an email pic of you as well..."
"glad your [sic] home safe and sound...we dont [sic] go back into session until Sept 5...si [sic] it's a nice long break...I am back in Florida now...its [sic]nice here..been raining today...it sounds like you will have some fun over the next few weeks...how old are you now?..." — Foley