Hastings Leads Way in Page Investigation

House Ethics Committee Chairman Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., left, and aide Ed Cassidy, arrive for a meeting of the committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Oct. 12, 2006. (AP Photo/Dennis Cook) (Dennis Cook - AP)

WASHINGTON -- He would rather talk about the latest apple crop, but these days Rep. Doc Hastings is spending more time scrutinizing salacious allegations against a former colleague.

Hastings, a 65-year-old Republican from Washington state, is chairman of the House ethics committee, which is investigating sexually explicit electronic messages sent by ex-Rep. Mark Foley to teenage male pages.

A former small-town paper supplier who represents a rural district best known for its apples and pears, the taciturn Hastings has long sought to blend into the scenery on Capitol Hill. Before taking over the committee last year, he had never held a Washington news conference.

That changed when the committee got the politically uncomfortable job of investigating former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas. The panel had hardly begun meeting before DeLay resigned from Congress.

Now Hastings finds himself in the spotlight again as he leads the Foley inquiry. Foley, R-Fla., resigned last month after he was confronted with instant messages sent to former male pages.

While clearly uneasy about his renewed visibility, Hastings pledges that the Foley investigation will go wherever the evidence leads.

"I take that responsibility that I have as the chairman of the ethics committee very seriously," he told The Associated Press. "Life gives you all sorts of responsibilities, and sometimes you just have to deal with them. I feel very confident in the direction we are moving."

While still in its early stages, the inquiry already has had some missteps.

After an Oct. 5 news conference announcing the investigation, critics accused Hastings of being too close to House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., a key focus of the Foley investigation. Some Democrats and others contend Hastert and other House leaders did not do enough to stop Foley after they became aware of some of the electronic messages he had sent.

Asked whether he personally supports Hastert, who named Hastings to lead the ethics committee, Hastings said, "I think the speaker has done an excellent job."

Hastings later clarified that his remarks were "not related to the matter at hand here."

"They should have brought in an outside counsel," said Fred Wertheimer, president of Democracy 21, a group that monitors congressional ethics. The ethics panel rejected that idea in favor of a four-member subcommittee of two Republicans and two Democrats from the full committee.