Deep Throat (Watergate)

:This article is about the source of information for Watergate; for other uses of the term, see Deep Throat.

Related Topics:
Watergate - Deep Throat

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Deep Throat is the pseudonym that was given to a secret source who leaked information about the involvement of U.S. President Richard Nixon's administration in the events that came to be known as the Watergate scandal. Deep Throat was an important source for Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, who together wrote a series of articles on the scandal that played a decisive role in exposing the misdeeds of the Nixon administration. The scandal would eventually lead to the resignation of President Nixon as well as prison terms for White House Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman, G. Gordon Liddy, chief counsel Charles Colson, and presidential adviser John Ehrlichman. In 2005 W. Mark Felt, a former Associate Director of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, confirmed that he is Deep Throat.

Related Topics:
Pseudonym - U.S. President - Richard Nixon - Watergate scandal - Washington Post - Bob Woodward - Carl Bernstein - White House Chief of Staff - H. R. Haldeman - G. Gordon Liddy - Charles Colson - John Ehrlichman - 2005 - W. Mark Felt - US - Federal Bureau of Investigation

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Howard Simons, the managing editor of the Washington Post at the time, dubbed the secret informant "Deep Throat," an allusion to a pornographic movie of the same name that had become a cultural phenomenon during the period; it was also a play on the term "deep background", used in journalism to mean information provided by a secret source that may not be reported directly. Deep Throat came to public attention when Woodward and Bernstein wrote All The President's Men, a book also made into an Academy Award-winning movie. In the movie, Deep Throat was portrayed by Hal Holbrook.

Related Topics:
Howard Simons - Pornographic movie - Deep background - All The President's Men - Academy Award - Hal Holbrook

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The identity of Deep Throat was one of the biggest mysteries of American politics and journalism in recent times, and the source of more than 30 years of much public curiosity. Woodward and Bernstein insisted they would not reveal his identity until he died. However, on May 31, 2005, after Felt himself revealed his identity in a Vanity Fair magazine article, Woodward, Bernstein, and former Post executive editor Ben Bradlee confirmed that Felt was the Watergate source known as Deep Throat.

Related Topics:
American politics - Journalism - May 31 - 2005 - Vanity Fair - Ben Bradlee

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