DeLay and Company

Then there is the spreading scandal around high-flying lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a former producer of low-budget movies whose most marketable asset was access to DeLay. Here, too, Buckham appears to have played a key role. "How did Jack Abramoff get into Tom DeLay's office?" asks a source close to the majority leader. "Ed Buckham." Abramoff and former DeLay spokesman Michael Scanlon are being investigated by the Senate and Justice Department for allegedly defrauding Indian tribes that had hired them as lobbyists. Abramoff and Scanlon refused to comment at Senate hearings last year and have denied wrongdoing. The two are suspected of convincing the tribes to spend vast amounts on such extravagances as basketball-arena skyboxes for parties for members of Congress and their staffs. The pair may have violated tax or criminal laws in their lobbying efforts and have also involved members of Congress, including California Representative John Doolittle and Arizona Representative J.D. Hayworth, who used the skyboxes but did not report their use as campaign donations, as required by law. DeLay and a number of other lawmakers are in hot water as well for accepting Abramoff-arranged foreign golfing junkets, including one to Scotland's fabled St. Andrews course. The Washington Post reported Saturday that DeLay's trip was indirectly financed by Indian tribes and gambling interests through payments to a nonprofit policy group that was sponsoring the trip. House rules would have prohibited direct payment. Most of the politicians who took trips organized by Abramoff claim they thought the junkets were paid for by charities or policy groups.

Even DeLay's efforts to defend himself have become tangled up in controversy. In December his legal-defense fund--which over the past four years has raised nearly $1 million in donations from corporations ranging from tobacco giant R.J. Reynolds and Reliant Energy to Domino's Pizza, as well as more than $300,000 from fellow members of Congress--was forced to return funds from registered lobbyists because those contributions violate House ethics rules.

But what has most angered Representatives about DeLay was a vote he engineered in December in the House Republican conference to change its rules so that G.O.P. congressional leaders could keep their posts even if they were indicted for a crime--a move that was clearly designed to protect his power if the Texas case took a bad turn. The move blindsided even Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert. The conference withdrew the change in the ensuing political firestorm but left in place the proposal, now being opposed by Democrats, that would make it impossible for the ethics committee to launch an investigation against any Representatives without a majority vote.

So, will DeLay survive? Capitol Hill has seen a fair share of its leaders fall to scandal over the past 15 years or so, and insiders will tell you there are signs to watch for. While a sense of foreboding is undeniably in the air, Republicans still seem fairly solidly behind the leader to whom they owe so much. "With Tom, it's going to have to be more than just allegations. Tom has done so much fund raising," says Indiana Representative Mark Souder. But he acknowledges, "There's a general feeling from all of us that Tom could be more careful. The accumulation of Mariana Islands, Korea, the stuff in Texas has some people wringing their hands more than others."