http://mywebtimes.com/ottnews/archives/ottawa/display.php?id=277316Weller refers incident to House
EDWARD FELKER, sng@nationalpress.com, 202-277-2487
Posted Online: 2006-10-20
WASHINGTON -- Rep. Jerry Weller, R-Morris, through his election attorney, moved Thursday to inform the House that a former male page or intern may have been the subject of inappropriate attention from another lawmaker, Weller's campaign manager said Thursday.
Steven Shearer said the congressman was not prepared to reveal the identity of the youth, the timing, nor the identity of the lawmaker, but felt confident that a former page or intern was "inappropriately invited to a social function by another congressman."
Weller and his staff learned of the alleged incident through conversations with reporters and others Thursday.
Shearer said Weller directed his campaign attorney to inform the House Page Board and the House Ethics Committee of the incident. The committee is investigating inappropriate contacts by former Rep. Mark Foley, R-Fla., with former pages and the handling of the matter by House leaders and staff.
Foley, 52, resigned abruptly late last month when it was revealed he had carried on explicit text message conversations with underage male pages.
Shearer said Weller's name came up before the page inquiry within the last week, but as far as the congressman knows, solely in the context that he was the sponsor of the page or intern in question.
He said neither the congressman nor his office ever knew of the invitation, what became of the incident, and have yet to confirm the identity of the former page or intern.
He said the congressman would provide whatever information might be asked of him by the Page Board or the committee, and stressed that neither had contacted Weller for any reason.
"When it comes down to it, we are very, very confident that's the extent of anything associated with Congressman Weller," Shearer said.
Congressional pages are high school juniors who work, live and study on Capitol Hill for one or two semesters. Their duties include ferrying messages and running errands.
Shearer could not confirm whether Foley or another lawmaker is the subject of Weller's notice to the House.
House leaders and staff have come under scrutiny for failing to act more forcefully when they first learned of non-explicit contact by Foley with a page after that person left Washington. The contact alarmed the page and his parents, and they relayed their concerns to the page's sponsor, Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-La., who in turn told House leaders.
His concerns came some months after Foley's chief of staff, Kirk Fordham, says he informed Rep. John Shimkus, R-Collinsville and chair of the three-member House Page Board, of his concerns over Foley's behavior. At that time, Shimkus and then-House Clerk Jeff Trandahl warned Foley to cease contact with pages, but did not inform the board nor the Ethics Committee.
The unconfirmed mention of Weller in the page inquiry had inspired intense speculation on Democratic-leaning Internet Web blogs about what role he might have played. Shearer accused the congressman's opponents of leaking his name in connection with the page inquiry, and said it came from "national Democrats what want to put another seat in play for free."
Weller's 11th Congressional District seat has been considered relatively safe by independent observers in recent weeks, though predictions of a disastrous Nov. 7 election for incumbent Republicans have many Democrats hoping that the party will post unexpected victories in seats like Weller's.
The race, however, has yet to attract big money from national party organizations on either side, indicating Weller is thought to hold the advantage over Democratic opponent John Pavich, a Beecher attorney and political newcomer.
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