Of all the phrases the Speaker of the House could have chosen, this was probably the wrong one.
“I’ve always urged members to travel,” Hastert ventured, “to have this type of intercourse with the world.”
Which sounds terribly inappropriate in light of this.
A Washington lobbyist under federal investigation for his lobbying activities arranged a lavish overseas trip to the island of Saipan for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, over the New Year’s holiday in 1997.
DeLay, his wife and daughter, and several aides, stayed for free at a beachfront resort.
The DeLay trip to the South Pacific island, originally reported by a “20/20” investigation, was part of an effort by former aide Jack Abramoff to stop legislation aimed at cracking down on sweatshops and sex shops in the American territory, which is known as the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. (emphasis added)