A Timeline of Politicians and Prostitutes

1974: Future television host Jerry Springer, then a city councilman in Cincinnati, resigned from office after it was revealed that he met a prostitute in a health club and paid her by personal check. The incident became an issue again in 1982, when Springer ran for governor. His campaign ran television ads in which Springer explained the incident and proclaimed that he was "not afraid" of the truth.

1976: Rep. Joe Waggonner, a Louisiana Democrat, was arrested in a Washington, D.C., prostitution sting. He was re-elected that fall and retired in 1978.

1976: Rep. Allan Howe, a Utah Democrat, was arrested after he approached two undercover policewomen for sex. He did not resign but lost his bid for re-election that fall.

1978: Rep. Fred Richmond, a New York Democrat, was arrested when he solicited sex from an underage male prostitute. He avoided prosecution by going into psychiatric counseling. His district re-elected him twice more, but he resigned in 1982 after pleading guilty to drug possession.

1980: Rep. Robert Bauman, a Maryland Republican, was arrested after patronizing an underage male prostitute. He blamed his actions on addictions to alcohol and sex. A month later, Bauman lost his bid for re-election.

1990: Rep. Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat, was reprimanded for his relations with prostitute Stephen Gobie. Years earlier, Frank had paid Gobie for sex; he eventually hired him as his assistant. Gobie was later accused of running a sex business out of Frank's home. Frank was censured by the House for writing a letter on his behalf. He has since won re-election. Frank apologized to his constituents: "I did not handle the pressures of having a public life, of being a closeted gay man, nearly as well as I should have."

1996: Clinton political strategist Dick Morris submitted his resignation after the Star tabloid revealed that he had engaged in a yearlong affair with a Washington-area prostitute. The woman, Sherry Ann Rowlands, claimed that Morris had allowed her to listen in on a telephone call from the president.

2001: Philip Giordano, the Republican mayor of Waterbury, Conn., was arrested for sexually abusing children after he was charged with paying a prostitute to arrange encounters with her underage daughter and niece. Giordano was convicted on federal and state charges. Now in federal prison, he recently filed his fifth appeal of his conviction.

2007: Sen. David Vitter, a Lousiana Republican, issued a public apology after his name was linked to a Washington escort service run by Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the so-called D.C. Madam. Earlier in his career, Vitter had been accused of seeing a prostitute in New Orleans, a charge which he denied.

2008: Federal investigators discover that Eliot Spitzer, the Democratic governor of New York, has been a client of an exclusive prostitution ring. It is alleged that he paid several thousand dollars for sexual services.

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