Ensign used job as "leverage" to woo lover, husband says

The latest charge to emerge from Jon Ralston's amazing interview with former John Ensign chief of staff Doug Hampton: Ensign pressured husband and wife to placate the senator's enraged wife — and cover up his affair with campaign aide Cynthia "Cindy" Hampton.

Hampton suggested he might pursue wrongful termination action — and possibly a civil suit claiming the Nevada Republican and his representatives slandered him by accusing him of extortion.

The former aide detailed a world in which Ensign recklessly intermingled his private and public lives with few boundaries — telling Ralston that the senator ask him to quit in April 2008, while allowing Cindy to temporarily retain her high-paying job as campaign treasurer.

Hampton complied — but only after being given an Ensign-orchestrated consulting contract with November, Inc., a firm run Ensign's top aide when he served as chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

In what may be the most damaging charge of all — Hampton claims that Ensign dangled his wife's campaign job as bait to pursue his sexual relationship with her.

"John uses that as leverage to contact Cindy; she's trying to get away from John," he said. "But he'll leave messages like, 'It is about your job, it is about a work issue we [need] to talk about.' Just being put in that position is a terrible position. ... It is leverage ... very difficult to navigate; our lives were enmeshed."

Ensign claims the affair continued into August 2008, months after Hampton claims it had broken up.

Ensign, Hampton claims, then paid "more than $25,000" to Cynthia as "severance" out of his own pocket — an amount now known to be $96,000 paid by Ensign's casino-owning parents to four members of the Hampton family.

He also maintains that Ensign personally paid Cynthia's insurance to compensate for Doug's loss of government benefits — all while continuing to pursue a sexual affair with Cindy Hampton.

Ensign has disputed Hampton's account and has accused him of a million-dollar shakedown effort.

Some excerpts:

— "[Ensign] orchestrated the creation of November Inc. and me getting [out] of the state and getting out of his official office. He told me, basically, at the same time he said, 'I'm in love with your wife' — 'You can't work with me anymore.'"

— "He made you feel incredibly guilty if you weren't part of making this go down the way he wanted it to."

— "I hope that the [Senate] Ethics [Committee] does a tremendous investigation. ... I would hope that the government would do some things as an employer."

Glenn Thrush is senior staff writer at Politico Magazine.