23rd JULY 1973 MONICA LEWINSKY _WHITHOUSE EMPLOYEE BORN - SCANDAL WITH BILL CLINTON

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Monica Lewinsky Biography

Sociologist, Television Personality (1973–)
IN THESE GROUPS
- FAMOUS PEOPLE IN JUDAISM
- FAMOUS PEOPLE IN U.S. POLITICS
- FAMOUS PEOPLE IN TELEVISION
- FAMOUS PEOPLE IN JOURNALISM & NONFICTION
- Monica Lewinsky is a former White House intern best known for her affair with President Bill Clinton.Monica Lewinsky was born on July 23, 1973, in San Francisco, California. After graduating from college, she took an internship and then a job at the White House. During the period from mid-1995 to 1997, Lewinsky was involved in a sexual relationship with President Bill Clinton. Her taped conversations with the president, and subsequent testimony, led to a media frenzy and a political firestorm.
- Early Life
- Monica Samille Lewinsky was born in San Francisco, California, on July 23, 1973. She was raised in the affluent neighborhoods of Brentwood and Beverly Hills, in Southern California. Her father, Bernard Lewinsky, is an oncologist, and her mother, Marcia Kaye Vilensky, is an author who publishes under the name Marcia Lewis. The Lewinskys divorced in 1988.
- Monica Lewinsky was raised Jewish and attended Sinai Akiba Academy and the John Thomas Dye School in her younger years. She graduated from Bel Air Prep (now Pacific Hills School) in 1991 and attended Santa Monica College while working for the drama department at Beverly Hills High School. She also began an affair with Andy Bleiler, her married high school drama instructor, around this time. Lewinsky enrolled at Lewis & Clark College after completing her two-year degree. She graduated with a degree in psychology in 1995.White House Career and Relationship with Bill Clinton
- Through a family friend, Monica Lewinsky secured an internship in the White House office of Chief of Staff Leon Panetta. After her internship ended, she accepted a paid position in the White House Office of Legislative Affairs.
- According to her later testimony, Lewinsky was involved in a sexual relationship with President Bill Clinton between the winter of 1995 and March 1997. The relationship involved nine encounters, some in the Oval Office. Lewinsky was transferred to the Pentagon in 1997. She confided in an older coworker, Linda Tripp, about her relationship with President Clinton. Shortly thereafter, Tripp began secretly recording Lewinsky's conversations with the president.
- Clinton was already burdened with a history of sexual misconduct allegations, and in 1997, lawyers working on the civil lawsuit filed by Arkansas state employee Paula Jones heard rumors of Lewinsky's relationship with the president. Lewinsky submitted a false affidavit denying the affair. It was at this point that Linda Tripp handed over her tapes to Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr. Clinton denied the affair under oath.
- News of the Clinton-Lewinsky affair broke in January 1998 and immediately dominated the media. Lewinsky spent weeks in hiding. She later reported that she had spent much of this stressful period knitting. After Kenneth Starr obtained a blue dress of Lewinsky's stained with Clinton's semen, the president admitted to an inappropriate relationship.
Life Post-Scandal

Lewinsky's affair with President Clinton mader her a pop-culture star. A Barbara Walters interview in which Lewinsky apologized to the Clintons drew record ratings. Lewinsky also cooperated with Andrew Morton on a 1999 biography titled Monica's Story.

Lewinsky experimented with a number of career paths after the scandal. She designed a handbag line, promoted the Jenny Craig weight-loss system and appeared as a television correspondent and host. In 2002, Lewinsky took audience questions during the taping of the HBO special Monica in Black and White.

Eager to escape the spotlight, Lewinsky moved to London, England, in 2005. The following year, she graduated from the London School of Economics with a master's degree in social psychology.

In 2013, some of Lewinsky's clothing and personal affects were put up for auction. The items, which had been submitted to the Kenneth Starr investigation in the 1990s, included a black negligee and a letter signed by President Clinton.
Synopsis

Lewinsky scandal

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

	This article is part of a series about Bill Clinton
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The Lewinsky scandal was an American political sex scandal emerging in 1998, from a sexual relationship between 49-year-old President Bill Clinton and a 22-year-old White House employee, Monica Lewinsky. The news of this extra-marital affair and the resulting investigation eventually led to the impeachment of President Clinton in 1998 by the U.S. House of Representatives and his subsequent acquittal on all impeachment charges of perjury and obstruction of justice in a 21-day Senate trial.^[1]

In 1995, Lewinsky, a graduate of Lewis & Clark College, was hired to work as an intern at the White House during Clinton's first term, and was later an employee of the White House Office of Legislative Affairs. While working at the White House she began a personal relationship with Clinton, the details of which she later confided to her friend and Defense Department co-worker Linda Tripp, who secretly recorded their telephone conversations.^[2]

When Tripp discovered in January 1998 that Lewinsky had sworn an affidavit in the Paula Jones case denying a relationship with Clinton, she delivered the tapes to Kenneth Starr, the Independent Counsel who was investigating Clinton on other matters, including the Whitewater scandal, the White House FBI files controversy, and the White House travel office controversy. During the grand jury testimony Clinton's responses were carefully worded, and he argued, "It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is",^[3] in regards to the truthfulness of his statement that "there is not a sexual relationship, an improper sexual relationship or any other kind of improper relationship."^[4] The wide reporting of the scandal led to criticism of the press for over-coverage.^[5]^[6]^[7] The scandal is sometimes referred to as "Monicagate",^[8] Lewinskygate",^[9] "Tailgate",^[10]"Sexgate",^[11] and "Zippergate",^[11] following the "-gate" nickname construction that has been popular since the Watergate scandal.

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Allegations of sexual contact[edit]

Monica Lewinsky

Lewinsky claimed to have had sexual encounters with Bill Clinton on nine occasions from November 1995 to March 1997. According to her published schedule, First Lady Hillary Clinton was at the White House for at least some portion of seven of those days.^[12]

In April 1996, Lewinsky's superiors relocated her job to the Pentagon, because they felt that she was spending too much time around Clinton.^[13] According to his autobiography, then-United Nations Ambassador Bill Richardson was asked by the White House in 1997 to interview Lewinsky for a job on his staff at the UN. Richardson did so, and offered her a position, which she declined.^[14] The American Spectator alleged that Richardson knew more about the Lewinsky affair than he declared to the grand jury.^[15]

Lewinsky confided in Linda Tripp about her relationship with Clinton. Tripp persuaded Lewinsky to save the gifts that Clinton had given her, and not to dry clean a semen-stained blue dress. Tripp reported their conversations to literary agent Lucianne Goldberg, who advised her to secretly record them,^[16] which Tripp began doing in September 1997. Goldberg also urged Tripp to take the tapes to Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr and bring them to the attention of people working on the Paula Jones case.^[17] In the fall of 1997, Goldberg began speaking to reporters (notably Michael Isikoff of Newsweek) about the tapes.^[18]

In January 1998, after Lewinsky had submitted an affidavit in the Paula Jones case denying any physical relationship with Clinton, she attempted to persuade Tripp to lie under oath in the Jones case. Instead, Tripp gave the tapes to Starr who was investigating the Whitewater controversy and other matters. Now armed with evidence of Lewinsky's admission of a physical relationship with Clinton, he broadened the investigation to include Lewinsky and her possible perjury in the Jones case.

Denial and subsequent admission[edit]

	Remarks including response to Monica Lewinsky scandal (January 26, 1998) Bill Clinton making a presentation that ends with a short commentary on theMonica Lewinsky scandal. The presentation is known for the quote "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky." (6:07) Remarks including response to Monica Lewinsky scandal (January 26, 1998) MENU 0:00 audio only version
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News of the scandal first broke on January 17, 1998, on the Drudge Report,^[19] which reported that Newsweek editors were sitting on a story by investigative reporter Michael Isikoff exposing the affair. The story broke in the mainstream press on January 21 in The Washington Post.^[20] The story swirled for several days and, despite swift denials from Clinton, the clamor for answers from the White House grew louder. On January 26, President Clinton, standing with his wife, spoke at a White House press conference, and issued a forceful denial in which he said:^[21]

Now, I have to go back to work on my State of the Union speech. And I worked on it until pretty late last night. But I want to say one thing to the American people. I want you to listen to me. I'm going to say this again: I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie, not a single time; never. These allegations are false. And I need to go back to work for the American people. Thank you.^[22]

Pundits debated whether or not Clinton would address the allegations in his State of the Union Address. Ultimately, he chose not to mention them. Hillary Clinton remained supportive of her husband throughout the scandal. On January 27, in an appearance on NBC's Today she said, "The great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for president."

For the next several months and through the summer, the media debated whether or not an affair had occurred and whether or not Clinton had lied or obstructed justice, but nothing could be definitively established beyond the taped recordings because Lewinsky was unwilling to discuss the affair or testify about it. On July 28, 1998, a substantial delay after the public break of the scandal, Lewinsky received transactional immunity in exchange for grand jury testimony concerning her relationship with Clinton.^[23] She also turned over a semen-stained blue dress (that Linda Tripp had encouraged her to save without dry cleaning) to the Starr investigators, thereby providing unambiguous DNA evidence that could prove the relationship despite Clinton's official denials.^[24]

Clinton admitted in taped grand jury testimony on August 17, 1998, that he had had an "improper physical relationship" with Lewinsky. That evening he gave a nationally televised statement admitting his relationship with Lewinsky which was "not appropriate".^[25]

Perjury charges[edit]

In his deposition for the Jones lawsuit, Clinton denied having "sexual relations" with Lewinsky. Based on the evidence provided by Tripp, a blue dress with Clinton's semen, Starr concluded that the president's sworntestimony was false and perjurious.

During the deposition, Clinton was asked "Have you ever had sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky, as that term is defined in Deposition Exhibit 1?" The judge ordered that Clinton be given an opportunity to review the agreed definition. Afterwards, based on the definition created by the Independent Counsel's Office, Clinton answered, "I have never had sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky." Clinton later stated, "I thought the definition included any activity by [me], where [I] was the actor and came in contact with those parts of the bodies" which had been explicitly listed (and "with an intent to gratify or arouse the sexual desire of any person"). In other words, Clinton denied that he had ever contacted Lewinsky's "genitalia, anus, groin, breast, inner thigh, or buttocks", and effectively claimed that the agreed-upon definition of "sexual relations" included giving oral sex but excluded receiving oral sex.^[26]

Two months after the Senate failed to convict him, President Clinton was held in civil contempt of court by Judge Susan Webber Wright.^[27] His license to practice law was suspended in Arkansas for five years and later by the United States Supreme Court.^[28] He was also fined $90,000 for giving false testimony.^[29] Clinton declined to appeal the civil contempt of court ruling, citing financial problems,^[27] but still maintained that his testimony complied with Wright's earlier definition of sexual relations.^[27]

Impeachment[edit]

Main article: Impeachment of Bill Clinton

In December 1998, Clinton's political party, the Democratic Party, was in the minority in both chambers of Congress. Some Democratic members of Congress, and most in the opposition Republican Party, believed that Clinton's giving false testimony and allegedly influencing Lewinsky's testimony were crimes of obstruction of justice and perjury and thus impeachable offenses. The House of Representatives voted to issue Articles of Impeachment against him which was followed by a 21-day trial in the Senate.

All of the Democrats in the Senate voted for acquittal on both the perjury and the obstruction of justice charges. Ten Republicans voted for acquittal for perjury: John Chafee (Rhode Island), Susan Collins (Maine), Slade Gorton (Washington), Jim Jeffords (Vermont),Richard Shelby (Alabama), Olympia Snowe (Maine), Arlen Specter (Pennsylvania), Ted Stevens (Alaska), Fred Thompson (Tennessee), and John Warner (Virginia). Five Republicans voted for acquittal for obstruction of justice: Chafee, Collins, Jeffords, Snowe, and Specter.

President Clinton was thereby acquitted of all charges and remained in office. There were attempts to censure the president by the House of Representatives, but those attempts failed.

Aftermath[edit]

Clinton and Lewinsky on a 1998Abkhazia stamp

Effect on 2000 presidential election[edit]

The scandal arguably affected the 2000 U.S. presidential election in two contradictory ways. Democratic Party candidate and sitting vice president Al Gore claimed that Clinton's scandal had been "a drag" that deflated the enthusiasm of their party's base, effectively suppressing Democratic votes. Clinton claimed that the scandal had made Gore's campaign too cautious, and that if Clinton had been allowed to campaign for Gore in Arkansas andNew Hampshire, either state would have delivered Gore's needed electoral votes regardless of what happened in Florida.^[30]

Political analysts have supported both views. Before and after the 2000 election, John Cochran of ABC News connected the Lewinsky scandal with a voter phenomenon he called "Clinton fatigue".^[31] Polling showed that the scandal continued to affect Clinton's low personal approval ratings through the election,^[32] and analysts such as Vanderbilt University's John G. Geer later concluded "Clinton fatigue or a kind of moral retrospective voting had a significant impact on Gore's chances".^[33] Other analysts sided with Clinton's argument, and argued that Gore's refusal to have Clinton campaign with him damaged his appeal.^[34]^[35]^[36]^[37]

Collateral scandals[edit]

During the scandal, supporters of President Clinton alleged that the matter was private and "about sex", and they claimed hypocrisy by at least some of those who advocated for his removal. For example, during the House investigation it was revealed that Henry Hyde, Republican chair of the House Judiciary Committee and lead House manager, also had an affair while in office as a state legislator. Hyde, aged 70 during the Lewinsky hearings, dismissed it as a "youthful indiscretion" when he was 41.^[38]

A highly publicized investigation campaign actively sought information that might embarrass politicians who supported impeachment. According to the British newspaper The Guardian,

Larry Flynt...the publisher of Hustler magazine, offered a $1 million reward... Flynt was a sworn enemy of the Republican party [and] sought to dig up dirt on the Republican members of Congress who were leading the impeachment campaign against President Clinton.

[...Although] Flynt claimed at the time to have the goods on up to a dozen prominent Republicans, the ad campaign helped to bring down only one. Robert Livingston – a congressman from Louisiana...abruptly retired after learning that Mr. Flynt was about to reveal that he had also had an affair.^[39]

Republican congressman Bob Livingston had been widely expected to become Speaker of the United States House of Representatives in the next Congressional session,^[40] then just weeks away, until Flynt revealed the affair. Livingston resigned and challenged Clinton to do the same.

Flynt's investigation also claimed that Congressman Bob Barr, another Republican House manager, had an affair while married; Barr had been the first lawmaker in either chamber to call for Clinton's resignation due to the Lewinsky affair. Barr lost a primary challenge less than three years after the impeachment proceedings.^[41]

Dan Burton, Republican Representative from Indiana, had stated "No one, regardless of what party they serve, no one, regardless of what branch of government they serve, should be allowed to get away with these alleged sexual improprieties...."^[42] In 1998, Burton admitted that he himself had an affair in 1983 that produced a child.^[43]

Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, Representative from Georgia and leader of the Republican Revolution of 1994,^[44] admitted in 1998 to having had an affair with a House intern while he was married to his second wife, at the same time as he was leading the impeachment of Bill Clinton for perjury regarding an affair with intern Monica Lewinsky.^[45]^[46]

Republican Helen Chenoweth-Hage from Idaho aggressively called for the resignation of President Clinton and admitted to her own six-year affair with a married rancher during the 1980s.^[47]

Personal acceptance[edit]

Historian Taylor Branch implied that Clinton had requested changes to Branch's 2009 Clinton biography, The Clinton Tapes: Wrestling History with the President, regarding Clinton's revelation that the Lewinsky affair began because "I cracked; I just cracked." Branch writes that Clinton had felt "beleaguered, unappreciated, and open to a liaison with Lewinsky" following "the Democrats' loss of Congress in the November 1994 elections, the death of his mother the previous January, and the ongoing Whitewater investigation".^[48]Publicly, Clinton had previously blamed the affair on "a terrible moral error" and on anger at Republicans, stating, "if people have unresolved anger, it makes them do non-rational, destructive things."^[49]