Senator helped husband of ex-mistress
WASHINGTON - Early last year, Senator John Ensign contacted a small circle of political and corporate supporters back home in Nevada - a casino designer, an airline executive, the head of a utility, and several political consultants - seeking work for a close friend and top Washington aide, Douglas Hampton.
“He’s a competent guy, and he’s looking to come back to Nevada. Do you know of anything?’’ one patron recalled Ensign asking.
The job pitch left out one salient fact: The senator was having an affair with Hampton’s wife, Cynthia, a member of his campaign staff. The tumult the liaison was causing both families prompted Ensign, a two-term Republican, to try to contain the damage and find a landing spot for Hampton.
In the coming months, the senator arranged for Hampton to join a political consulting firm and lined up several donors as his lobbying clients, according to interviews, e-mail messages, and other records. Ensign and his staff then repeatedly intervened on the companies’ behalf with federal agencies in Washington, often after urging from Hampton.
While the affair made national news in June, the role that Ensign played in assisting Hampton and helping the clients he represented has not been previously disclosed. Several legal specialists say those activities may have violated an ethics law that bans senior aides from lobbying the Senate for a year after leaving their posts. In acknowledging the affair, Ensign, 51, cast it as personal transgression, not a professional one. But an examination of his conduct shows that in trying to clean up the mess from the illicit relationship and distance himself from the Hamptons, he entangled political supporters, staff members, and colleagues.
The senator declined to be interviewed. But his office said the inquiries he had made about work for Hampton were “only recommendation calls.’’
