Barton to go mum on nude photo, cites investigation
Congressman hints at being victim of revenge porn.
WASHINGTON — Suggesting he’s a victim of revenge porn from a jilted lover, U.S. Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, says he plans to go silent about the release of a nude photo of him online because police are investigating the disclosure as a possible crime against him. Authorities have not confirmed an investigation.
The 68-year-old Barton, who joined the House in 1985, has acknowledged sharing intimate material with a lover and accused her of threatening to make it public when he ended the relationship. The unidentified woman told The Washington Post that she did not put the image online and said the congressman sought to intimidate her by threatening to go to the authorities if she exposed his conduct.
The he said-she said dispute erupted amid sexual misconduct allegations drawing in several other members of Congress as well as Senate Republican candidate Roy Moore of Alabama, who is accused of disrobing a 14-year-old girl. The consequences for Barton are not immediately apparent aside from his mortification: The relationship with the woman was evidently consensual.
The Post published details of a secretly recorded conversation between Barton and his lover from 2015 in which he threatened to “take all this crap to the Capitol Hill Police and have them launch an investigation” if she did not agree to keep “inappropriate photographs and video” that he had exchanged with her from becoming public. He said she had already shared material with other women with whom he had been involved.
In a statement after that report, Barton said the “Capitol Police reached out to me and offered to launch an investigation and I have accepted. Because of the pending investigation, we will have no further comment.” He said the woman’s comments on the tape could be evidence of a “potential crime against me.”
Capitol Police have not said whether they have begun an investigation. A message left by The Associated Press at Barton’s district office in Arlington was not returned. The voicemail for his office in Washington was full.
Making explicit images available without the subject’s permission is a felony in the District of Columbia and a Class A misdemeanor in Texas.