The man who broke the most recent Anthony Weiner sexting scandal said that the embattled New York politician presented his marriage to young women as a sham and even planned to purchase a “secret bunker” in Chicago that could house real-life trysts.
“They talked to each other daily on the phone. They told each other they loved each other,” Nik Richie, the founder of the gossip website TheDirty.com, said Wednesday on HuffPost Live.
Weiner’s sexting partner, who began her virtual relationship with Weiner at age 22, felt that the marriage between Weiner and his wife Huma, a former Hillary Clinton aide, was “more of a staged marriage for political gain” and believed that her romance with Weiner would be actualized in a secret condo in Chicago.
“They were going to be able to act [their sex fantasies] out” in a condo in Chicago, which was going to be Weiner’s “secret bunker” for sex, according to Richie.
“She believed him. This girl was starstruck,” Richie said.
“He had a really strange shoe fetish,” Richie said. “The guy has serious, serious issues. There’s no way this is the only girl.”
Richie indicated that Weiner’s marriage may, in fact, be a political facade.
“They think they’re Bill and Hillary Clinton,” Richie said, adding that Huma Weiner “was just so stoic” in her press conference. “I didn’t see any heart, any love.”
Of Weiner’s textual mistress, Richie said, “She’s in shock right now.”
The 23-year old woman at the heart of the scandal has been identified in some reports as “Sydney Elaine Leathers.” She reportedly hails from Indiana and has worked in a variety of low-level political positions, including as a volunteer for Elizabeth Warren’s 2012 U.S. Senate campaign.
A Democrat official told The Daily Caller that the party has no record of “Sydney Elaine,” the name listed on the woman’s Twitpic page, being a field organizer or staffer for the Obama campaign.
Richie, the stage name of 34-year-old Hooman Abedi Karamian, is married to reality television star Shayne Lamas. He was accused of libel in 2011 by Cincinnati Bengals cheerleader Sarah Jones over a story he ran insinuating that Jones was having a relationship with the team’s kicker.
