Politics

Menendez’s Chief of Staff An Ashley Madison User

REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

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Ethan Barton Editor in Chief
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An Ashley Madison account holder with the same name as the chief of staff for New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez paid for the account using a House of Representatives computer during the period the aide worked for the U.S. Helsinki Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.

Although the Ashley Madison account for “Fred Turner” used a personal email, the payment came from a computer with a house.gov IP address. The only person that has worked in Congress with that name in recent years is Menendez’s current chief of staff, according to Inside Gov.

Menendez was indicted by the Department of Justice on corruption charges in April for using his office to help Salomon Melgen, a Florida ophthalmologist, in exchange for nearly $1 million worth of gifts and campaign contributions.

A hack on the adulterous affair-facilitating website, which uses the tagline “Life is Short. Have an Affair,” resulted in two data dumps that exposed millions of users’ personal information, including credit cards and email addresses.

Hundreds of federal employees, including at least two U.S. attorneys, a hacker with the Department of Homeland Security and a Department of Justice investigator, used their government offices to pay for the Ashley Madison accounts, The Associated Press reported.

The data dump also contained an estimated 15,000 government or military email addresses associated with Ashley Madison accounts, according to the Federal Times.

The IP address of the House computer corresponds with house.gov, even though Turner works in the Senate, because he was employed with the House-based Helsinki Commission when he made payments to Ashley Madison in 2012 and 2014.

The Twitter handle that matches Turner’s Ashley Madison profile name, “seetheworldly,” only follows five other accounts – two of which belong to Menendez. The name linked on Twitter is “Frank Thomas,” which shares Turner’s initials.

The Turner’s profile notes that his schedule is “very flexible” and that his favorite sports team is from Menendez’s state, the New Jersey Devils.

The addresses Turner listed are both located near his alma mater, American University. The name on the credit card associated with Turner’s Ashley Madison account number later changed to “gift card” and listed the address as “1234 main st.”

Turner did not respond to multiple The Daily Caller News Foundation requests for comment.

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