Hastert: Those Hiding Information "Should Be Gone"

Oct. 10, 2006— -- Beleaguered House Speaker Dennis Hastert says that anyone found to have covered up information involving former Florida Rep. Mark Foley and inappropriate e-mails he sent to young congressional pages should resign.

"If anybody is found to have hidden information or covered up information, then they really should be gone," Hastert said to reporters after an address at the Aurora Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

Hastert has been under fire for his handling of the Foley controversy. Foley resigned after ABC News reported and confronted him about explicit e-mails he had sent teenage male pages. Hastert has insisted he was not aware of the allegations until recently, but said he accepted responsibility for the mushrooming controversy.

He said to reporters today that any lawmaker who was aware of Foley's behavior with the pages should have come forward.

"If it was something of a nature that should've been reported or brought forward, then they should have done that," he said today

Hastert said he did not know of any details when questioned about a report that Arizona congressman Jim Kolbe was aware years ago of inappropriate e-mails sent by Foley.

"All I know at that time was Congressman Kolbe was on the page board," said Hastert. "I replaced him in 2002. . . I don't know anything more about it."

Meanwhile , Kolbe issued a statement saying that he had been informed by a page of Foley's behavior, and passed the complaints along as early as 2000 or 2001 to Foley's office and the clerk of the House.

"Some time after leaving the page program, an individual I had appointed as a page contacted my office to say he had received e-mails from Rep. Foley that made him uncomfortable," Kolbe said in a statement.

"I was not shown the content of the messages and was not told they were sexually explicit. It was my recommendation that this complaint be passed along to Rep. Foley's office and the clerk who supervised the page program. This was done promptly."