The Washington Independent

Posts Tagged john ensign

Senators Push Bill to Extend $8,000 Homebuyer Credit Six Months

By | 09.17.09 | 4:49 pm

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Thursday put his weight behind the congressional push to extend by six months the $8,000 tax credit to first-time homebuyers.  The current credit, passed as part of the $787 billion economic stimulus bill, expires Dec. 1.

Sens. John Ensign (R-Nev.) and Ben Cardin More…

‘C Street’ Democrat: Don’t Ask Me, I Just Live There

By | 07.23.09 | 4:07 pm

The Michigan Messenger caught up today with Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), who lives at the “C Street” house made famous of late by several current and former residents, including Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.), Gov. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.) and former Rep. Chip Pickering (R-Miss.) — all of whom More…

Line of the Day

By | 07.13.09 | 1:00 pm

As Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) railed away at Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, we were reminded of Coburn’s role in the recent sex scandal involving Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.).

To recap, Coburn, an obstetrician and gynecologist who lives with Ensign in Washington, has said he counseled his colleague to More…

Ensign’s Parents Paid Off Mistress

By | 07.09.09 | 5:07 pm

Things just keep getting worse for Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.).

An attorney for U.S. Sen. John Ensign says the senator’s parents gave his mistress and her family nearly $100,000.

In statement released Thursday, Paul Coggins says Ensign’s parents made the gifts “out of concern for the well being of longtime

More…

CREW Ups Pressure Over Ensign Severance Scandal

By | 07.09.09 | 3:27 pm

Not satisfied with just an internal congressional ethics investigation, the public interest group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has called on the Justice Department to look into the claims that Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) paid his former mistress $25,000 when she left her job with his campaign PAC. More…

Coburn Denies Urging Payments to Ensign’s Mistress

By | 07.09.09 | 11:58 am

Via The Washington Post, the office of Sen. Tom Coburn yesterday denied that the Oklahoma Republican told housemate Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) to pay millions of dollars to his former mistress to keep the affair quiet — a charge leveled by the husband of the mistress in a More…

Report: Coburn Urged Ensign to Pay Millions to Mistress

By | 07.08.09 | 5:55 pm

So says the Las Vegas Sun, which has conducted an exclusive interview with Doug Hampton, the husband of Sen. John Ensign’s (R-Nev.) former mistress.

Hampton and Ensign were bonded by their conservative evangelical faith. Hampton said he reached out to intermediaries involved in a Christian fellowship home in Washington,

More…

Haley Barbour: Mum on 2012, Chatty on Cooking Frogs

By | 07.07.09 | 3:52 pm

With leading contenders for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination dropping like flies, an increasing amount of buzz has surrounded Haley Barbour, the cigar-chomping former Republican National Committee chairman and current governor of Mississippi. Speculation only crescendoed when Barbour visited Iowa and New Hampshire and More…

BREAKING: Sanford Admits to Affair, Resigns as Chairman of Republican Governors Association

By | 06.24.09 | 2:40 pm

After days of speculation about his mysterious disappearance, Gov. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.) just admitted to an extramarital affair and resigned as the chairman of the Republican Governors Association.

In a drawn-out press conference that began with a long series of apologies and repeated references to his friend Tom Davis, Sanford More…

John Ensign Is No Longer the Third-Ranking Republican in the Senate

By | 06.17.09 | 1:04 pm

According to The Associated Press, he has given up his leadership of the Senate Republican Policy Committee.

UPDATE: I’m hearing that Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), a rising star who’s expected to sail to re-election next year, is being tipped as a possible replacement for Ensign.