By: E&P Staff Vicki Iseman, the lobbyist featured in a controversial New York Times story that, in some eyes, implied she had an affair with Sen. John McCain, is speaking out.
She granted her first interviews since the February story to National Journal investigative reporter Edward T. Pound. The story was posted online Thursday and will appear in print shortly.
Iseman repeats the denial she first made to the Times that she and McCain were romantically involved. The Times story did not state the two were having an affair, but quoted unnamed McCain aides who said they had become convinced the two were romantically involved.
In the National Journal story, Iseman lashes out at the Times, which she said "chose to disregard" many answers she gave to all the paper's questions.
"The New York Times set out to write a story about a 'romantic relationship' in exchange for legislative favors," she said. "Make the lobbyist a prostitute -- pretty heady stuff. The only problem was, they were wrong on all counts."
Iseman said the four reporters assigned to the story became "marionettes" of John Weaver, the McCain strategist who was forced off the campaign in July 2007.
"She said that Weaver had an 'ax to grind' and had used The Times to orchestrate the story and damage McCain's presidential campaign," Pound wrote.
Weaver, the National Journal reported, "flatly denied" Iseman's assertions.
And Dean Baquet, the Times assistant managing editor who heads the D.C. bureau, defended the story.
"I think that the story stands up, an important story, a strong story," Baquet told Pound, adding the paper "had ample, multiple sources for the story" and aggressively tried to present Iseman's side. The Times tried to get her views early in the reporting process, but "we couldn't get her to sit down and talk." Iseman did answer Times questions posed by e-mail.
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