Dennis Hastert, longtime Republican House speaker who went to prison,
dies at age 84
[October 06, 2026]
By MICHAEL TARM and HERBERT G. McCANN
CHICAGO (AP) — Dennis Hastert, whose congressional legacy as the
longest-serving Republican House speaker was later fouled by allegations
that he had molested high school athletes during his prior career as a
teacher and wrestling coach, has died, a coroner said Monday. He was 84.
Hastert, who was speaker from 1999 until 2007 and spent more than a year
in prison later in life, died Saturday of natural causes at his home
while receiving hospice care, according to Kendall County Coroner
Jacquie Purcell.
When he was sentenced in 2016 to more than a year behind bars, the
former history teacher became one of the highest-ranking American
politicians ever ordered to prison.
In the late 1990s, Hastert was a little-known Illinois lawmaker with a
reputation for congeniality that had helped him ascend the ranks of
congressional leaders. When Newt Gingrich lost support because of ethics
violations and the GOP’s poor showing in an election, Republicans
elected Hastert to succeed him. In his first weeks on the job in 1999,
he presided over the House while the Senate conducted then-President
Bill Clinton’s impeachment trial.
After the GOP reclaimed the White House, Hastert helped pass
then-President George W. Bush's legislative agenda.
A post-congressional scandal lands Hastert in prison
In 2015 he was accused of evading banking regulations as part of a plan
to pay hush money to conceal unspecified "prior misconduct." Nearly a
year later, prosecutors said Hastert’s alleged misconduct involved the
sexual abuse of teenage boys on his wrestling team in Yorkville, a small
town west of Chicago.
Prosecutors said Hastert sexually abused at least four team members
during his coaching career, which lasted from 1965 to 1981.
The person Hastert was paying, identified in court papers only as
Individual A, said the abuse occurred in a motel room when he was 14 on
the way home from wrestling camp. Hastert allegedly touched other
wrestlers in a locker room after saying he would give them massages. Two
wrestlers said Hastert performed sexual acts on them.
Prosecutors also described a recliner where Hastert often sat in the
locker room with a direct view of the stalls where the boys showered.
Hastert agreed to plead guilty to evading banking laws. In all, he paid
more than $1.7 million out of $3.5 million that he had promised to
Individual A, sometimes in lump sums of $100,000 cash.
At the sentencing hearing, where he received 15 months behind bars, the
visibly angry judge called Hastert a “serial child molester.”
In a statement, Hastert said he was “deeply ashamed” and admitted that
he "mistreated” some of his athletes. But he never referred directly to
sexual abuse.
He knew how hard being speaker would be
When he became House speaker, Hastert was aware of the pitfalls of
holding the powerful position.
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House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., gestures during a news
conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, on June 29, 2005 to
discuss Social Security. (AP Photo/Lauren Victoria Burke, File)
"You know, in this business, especially in a job like this, you can
get your head someplace where it shouldn't be," Hastert said in a
1999 interview with The Associated Press. “But you come back home,
and you're home. You're back where you've always been, and your feet
are back on the ground.”
As the recount of the 2000 presidential election dragged on,
Hastert’s aides briefed him on the possibility that he might become
acting president in the event of an Electoral College deadlock.
"I really didn't want to be president, temporary or otherwise,"
Hastert wrote in a 2004 memoir.
Hastert’s journey to Congress from his boyhood farm appeared to be
the result of fate and luck.
In 1980, he finished third in an Illinois House primary. But the
incumbent became fatally ill, and GOP leaders chose Hastert to take
his place on the November ballot, where he won in a traditional GOP
stronghold.
Hastert became a congressional candidate in 1986 and beat the
Democrat with 52% of the vote, his smallest margin of victory in a
congressional race.
In Washington, Hastert served quietly in House leadership, working
closely with Gingrich and then-House Majority Whip Tom DeLay after
Republicans took control in 1995.
Hastert became wealthy largely through a complex web of transactions
that coincided with one of his own highway earmarks increasing the
value of land he had purchased in his district.
He was forced to step down as speaker in 2007, when Democrats gained
control of the House, and he resigned his seat later that year.
Born in Aurora, Illinois, Hastert earned a bachelor's degree in
economics from Wheaton College in 1964 and a master’s in education
from Northern Illinois University in 1967.
In 2007, Wheaton named its new public policy center the J. Dennis
Hastert Center for Economics, Government and Public Policy. After
Hastert’s indictment, the school removed his name in 2015. Other
organizations abandoned associations with Hastert, and his portrait
was removed from a hallway outside the House chamber.
Hastert lived his entire life in Chicago's suburbs, primarily in the
Yorkville area. While growing up, he helped his father with the
family's feed business.
Survivors include his wife, Jean, and two adult sons.
___
Tarm and McCann are former Associated Press reporters. Associated
Press reporter Scott Bauer in Madison, Wisconsin, contributed to
this report.
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