Chapter 1

Forgotten Is Forgiven

When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.
—Proverbs 11:2 (NIV)

Humility is the mother of giants. One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.

—G. K. Chesterton, the Father Brown stories

The worst day of my life began as one of the most luminous. The contrast between the glory of that morning and the horror of that evening bordered on the surreal.

During my seven and a half years at the White House, working as a special assistant to President George W. Bush as the deputy director of the office of public liaison and as one of Karl Rove’s aides, I was rarely at my desk later than 6:30 in the morning. I loved getting to work early, going through my e-mails, reading through the morning papers, preparing for what almost always turned into a crushingly busy day. The pace was usually in overdrive, and I was raised to be of service, to be energetic and cheerful in my vocation. I loved my job. The sense of playing a small part at the large center of our nation’s public life was a gift from God. My White House colleagues felt the same way, and one of the little known things about the Bush White House is how much the staff liked and respected one another and how close we were. This rarely happens in any White House team. I am sure there were exceptions, but by and large we loved our work, we loved working with one another on behalf of a president in whom we believed.

After I got through what one of my interns once called “the White House morning chores,” I walked through Lafayette Park, across the street from the White House, to the Hay-Adams Hotel for breakfast with a longtime friend. The park is quiet and beautiful most mornings, ringed by large trees and redbrick sidewalks, with the famous statue of Andrew Jackson on horseback in the middle.

My friend and I had not seen each other in a long time. His young family and ours were neighbors for many years on the same quiet circle in Northern Virginia, so our meeting was a mini-reunion. Our hour together went by all too rapidly. As we departed the hotel, he remarked to me what a beautiful morning it was, one of the best of the year. We shook hands and promised to meet again soon. On my way back to the White House, I remember saying a small prayer, thanking God for great friends like Dennis. My wife and I both believed these White House years were good years for our family, despite the busyness of it all. 

I was on my way to a meeting in the Eisenhower Building, where my office was located, next to the White House. I stopped into my office to quickly check my e-mails and to get a file folder. When I popped open my e-mail, I saw a note from a reporter I knew during my decade on Capitol Hill, working for U.S. Senator Dan Coats of Indiana as his press secretary and communications director.

I opened the e-mail, read it once, felt the blood drain from my head, got down on my knees next to my desk, and was overcome with a fear and trepidation as never before. My only prayer, which I repeated again and again, was “God help me. God help me.” I knew instantly this would be the most impossible day of my life, and my heart was pounding as if to burst from my chest. I sat back down and responded to the reporter’s e-mail. She told me she learned I plagiarized part of a recent column I wrote in my local hometown newspaper, The News-Sentinel. Was it true, she wanted to know? It was indeed true, and I told her so instantly by return e-mail. When I sent that e-mail reply, acknowledging what I had done, in all my guilt and shame, I knew events of that day would move rapidly toward my resignation from the White House and service to a president I loved and respected. 

Every one of the principles I held and espoused, every one of the values I was raised by—truth in all things, character above intellect, unquestioned integrity before God and man alike—every mentor who ever invested part of his or her life in me, I had violated and violated completely. My hypocrisy was now transparent, and I was guilty as charged. What a prideful fool I was, and it was all my fault without excuse or exception. Mine would be a public failure in the front ranks. Whatever punishment was to follow that day and in the weeks to come, I deserved completely. 

The avalanche of media coverage began almost immediately. One of George W. Bush’s aides was caught in a plagiarism scandal. My colleagues were incredulous and disbelieving: What were the details? What was the context? Surely it could not be true? I had become close friends with many of my colleagues in various offices at the White House; and as they learned of the story, their e-mails and calls of disbelief began pouring in. Surely, most said, this was a mistake or an oversight or due to busyness or sloppiness. Surely, they said, in all their friendship and love, I could not have “meant” to plagiarize.

But I did it knowingly and repeatedly, as stories in the days to follow would show. There were no extenuating circumstances or justifications for what I did. It was not a mistake or an oversight. It was not due to sloppiness. I was deceptive, and it was all rooted in vanity and pride.

The more my colleagues’ regard and friendship came to me, the more painful it became because of the violation it represented. I utterly violated their trust in me. I personally put a premium on collegiality and worked to foster that kind of civility and diplomacy of which I was now unmasked as a violator. I earned their trust and built wonderful friendships and relationships only to let them down completely. I not only violated their trust and friendship, but I also violated the trust and friendship of the man to whom I owed so much, the president himself.

Mine was a high-profile role, relational in tone and quality. As people around the country with whom I worked learned of my story, they began to call and e-mail in response to the major cable and radio networks who were broadcasting my story of plagiarism. Even as I write these words, the horror of that morning and the events of that day come back to haunt me with the pain and awfulness I inflicted on others but most especially the three people I love most in the world, my wife and sons. I embarrassed them all deeply in a betrayal rooted in self-centeredness and ambition, both of which were venal.

I resigned that afternoon, writing a personal letter of apology to the president. I departed the White House that Friday shattered and fearful, exiting the White House gates as I had done a thousands times before and vowing to myself that, even as I returned to work to foster a smooth transition for my successor, I would never again darken the doorstep of the West Wing. I had always held up as nearly sacred ground that part of the White House because of the thousands of decisions—many of them life-and-death decisions of war and peace—that are made there, which so deeply impact the direction of our country. 

Upon my arrival home that afternoon, I gathered my family into our living room and, in no uncertain terms and placing no varnish on my rottenness, explained to my wife and sons what I had done. The look on their faces crushed me, so completely had I betrayed their love and trust in me. When I asked for their forgiveness, they gave it to me willingly but in a state of disbelief. The evening remains a blur, and when I finally went up to bed, I shut my door, turned off the lights, and literally collapsed on the floor, like a house of cards, a completely broken man, wailing in pain.

All my professional goals, all my dreams, all I spoke about and encouraged and advocated in the lives of my own sons and in nearly twenty years of working with outstanding interns and other young people in Washington, all that undergirded my worldview as a Christian had gone up in flames, roaring and snapping like so much kindling. My life caved in, and it was all of my own doing. With it I wounded the people I loved most in the world, and that seemed to me unforgivable. The anguish I felt that night—mental, physical, and spiritual anguish of the deepest sort—is the realest thing I have ever encountered or imagined. As a Christian, I was gripping the cross of Christ and holding on for life. I genuinely hated myself with a loathing that bordered on the diabolical. 

My personal collapse evoked Dante’s powerful stanza on humiliation, repentance, and contrition, and it stung deeply:

What better can we do than prostrate fall
Before him reverent; and there confess
Humbly our faults, and pardon beg; with tears
Wat’ring the ground, and with our sighs the air
Frequenting, sent from hears contrite, in sign
Of sorrow unfeign’d, and humiliation meek?

A sleepless night of tossing and turning ensued, further blighted when I heard the morning newspapers snap down on the stoop outside and below the bedroom window. I knew my awful story would be there for all our friends and neighbors and parishioners and community to read. The shame would deepen, and it did, like the incessant drip of a broken faucet. All those yet to see the story of my fall and scandal would read about it that Saturday morning, and another day of shame would commence, which I deserved but my wife and kids did not. We could not bring ourselves to leave the house that day.

In Washington, when high-order transgression takes place in the political classes, it is de rigueur to cut off the offender. To excise the cancer. To rid him or her from the system and move forward toward the inexorable goals of politics and policy. When a staffer embarrasses the representative, or the senator, or the president, a divorce must take place leading to persona non grata status for the victimizer.

I knew I was finished. I believed my friendships would end; my phone would go silent; the e-mails would cease; the head-of-steam mantra of nearly eight years at the White House would dissipate—poof!—overnight, resulting in my own personal denouement, fall, disgrace, and destruction. The nadir had seemingly arrived, I thought, and this chapter in the book of my life would be slammed shut for good.

Only that is not what happened. 

In all my pride and arrogance, grace broke through and prevailed. At the very moment I was crushed under the weight of my own sin and wrongdoing, God’s mercy materialized as if in a dream. What followed was a miracle in my life and the life of my family. The combination of grace and mercy we were about to experience shattered those Washington myths about which I had been warned. This period of twinned grace and mercy commenced on the Saturday morning after the worst day and night of my life, and it would prevail, opening up new chapters I did not deserve.

People were not enabling or making excuses for me; they knew the enmity I deserved. But they believed in second chances and forgiveness, and I learned people want you to get back up and start again. They won’t abide excuses or cheap explanations, and I had none to offer. But they deserved to see and hear my contrition in words and actions.

At almost exactly 10:00 a.m., our phone rang. It was my mother and father, my best friends in the world after my wife. They said they were calling to tell me they loved me. I broke down, and then apologized for disappointing, hurting, and embarrassing them. But they told me again, they loved me and forgave me. They wanted me to know they would be with Jenny and me and the boys through all the days ahead.

About fifteen minutes later I received another call, this one from a well-known, well-loved Washingtonian. I will never forget his words: “Tim, I can only imagine how tough this morning is for you. I just want you to know two things: Our friendship remains and I want to help you and your family. Call me when you feel you can.” I thanked him but again found it tough to speak in response to his generosity of spirit. 

A neighbor knocked on our door, saying she “heard some news” and just wanted to know how we were and if there was anything she might do. A church friend phoned from Florida, where she was vacationing, and asked how she might pray for me and my family. The outpouring of love came in spite of my own infamy and wretchedness. On this, the day after my crushing failure, the phones did not go silent; the e-mail flow from those who were concerned about me and my family did not cease; friends did not rush for the tall grass but rather offered to help us; colleagues did not abandon us but offered their prayers; neighbors did not shun or spurn us; our church family reached out and embraced us. My pastor, Chris Esget, asked me to come spend time with him, which I did, and his friendship and counsel were boundless.

My time with him, of confession and absolution, was solemn; and I came to see the revelation of my sin actually started a process of restoration and liberation. Also, I came to see I could not experience joy without first mourning my sin. In fact, I entered a period of grieving over what I had done and saw that its weight was devastating. That grieving brought me closer to God because the enormity of my sin—against God, my family, my friends, my colleagues, my editors, the people who read my columns—was immense. I brought pain and sorrow to those whose love is my privilege. I fell short of what God wanted for my life. I knew that in my repentance I was honor bound to know the gravity of my sin and it was ugly.

Regret, remorse, contrition, and confession, however, were not enough. I had to experience sorrow for my transgressions because I offended both God and man. My brokenheartedness over what I had done brought me comfort; it was, for me, the pathway to God’s fathomless forgiveness and love. The writer Henry Blackaby wrote that God’s “infinite grace is sufficient for the most terrible sin.” I lived the reality of that insight.

All day Saturday after my resignation and at church the following day—walking in those doors was one of the most difficult things I have ever done—I found unbounded and unmerited love. It would be replicated in the days and weeks ahead. The narrative was the same: solid friendship and support where and as needed. We were overwhelmed and humbled.

Monday dawned; I never wanted so much for a single day not to arrive. I headed for the White House to begin packing and preparing for a flawless transition for the person who would take my place. When I walked into my office that Monday, I wept bitterly; the memories of the people and the dynamism of what occurred there were overwhelming. My colleagues in the Office of Public Liaison had become a second family. Their generosity of spirit during those tough days touched the depth of my soul.

Shortly after I arrived, I received a call from one of the best men I have ever known in Washington, Josh Bolten, the president’s chief of staff. We met on the first Bush campaign in Austin, where he oversaw the policy shop. We held a high regard for each other dating from that time. Would I please come over and chat with him in his West Wing office, he asked? “Josh,” I told him, “I appreciate this call more than you know, but I vowed to myself never to enter the West Wing again, so badly have I screwed up.” No, he said, it was important for me to come over and talk with him.

I walked into his beautiful corner office, the sun streaming in the nearly floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Executive Drive and the Eisenhower Building, his Harley Davidson memorabilia here and there. He hugged me and shook my hand as I entered, and before I could say anything, he asked, “How are Jenny and the boys doing? How are you? I forgive you, Tim.” 

“But Josh,” I told him, “I have embarrassed the president, and you, and all my colleagues, and I have violated”—he stopped me. It was over, he said, and it was a new day. A fresh start. He asked me to sit down on the couch next to the fireplace over which hung my favorite portrait of Lincoln in the White House. We chatted about the momentous events of the last eight years and about the work we collaborated on most recently, the confirmation of President Bush’s third attorney general, Mike Mukasey. Josh’s kindness moved me to tears. I pledged to him a smooth transition as I exited the White House, which he appreciated, and as I departed he said, “Oh, and the boss wants to see you this week,” meaning the president. 

I knew instantly what that meant: a much-deserved woodshed moment. I imagined the president, Josh, and perhaps my immediate boss Barry Jackson, Karl Rove’s successor, would formally level the boom. I knew it would be as unpleasant and awkward as possible, and I knew I deserved it. 

Only that scenario never materialized.

When I arrived later that week to see the president in the Oval Office, I expected to be greeted in the anteroom by Josh, or Barry, or one of the deputy chiefs of staff. But only the president’s executive assistant was there. Then I heard the president’s voice: “Timmy, is that you? Please come in.” Now my mind began to race. This meeting would only be the president and me, which would make it all the more awkward and unpleasant. I assumed he would read me the proverbial “riot act.” I would offer a heartfelt apology, and we would say our farewells and be done with it.

Only that is not what happened.

What followed was the greatest professional moment of my life, far greater than being offered the job at the White House by Karl Rove; far greater than even the highest high points of my time there, among them both presidential inaugurals and the initial swearing-in in the East Room when we were a new staff in 2001. 

I walked in; closed the door (my heart was pounding), turned to the president, and said, “Mr. President, I owe you a . . .” 

“Tim,” he said, “I want you to know I forgive you.” 

“But Mr. President, I owe you . . .” 

“Tim,” he said, “I have known mercy and grace in my own life, and I am offering it to you now. You are forgiven,” he said again. 

“But Mr. President, you should have taken me by the lapels and tossed me into Pennsylvania Avenue. I embarrassed you and the team; I am so sorry.” 

“Tim, you are forgiven,” he said again, “and mercy is real. Now we can talk about this, or we can spend some time together talking about the last seven years.”

I was stunned. The leader of the free world, on whose administration I brought shame, not only told me he forgave me multiple times but proceeded to ask me to sit down and have a conversation. I walked over to one of the two couches, and he said, “No, sit here,” pointing to the chair of honor in front of the fireplace in the Oval Office. That is the place where the vice president, or head of state, or distinguished guest sits during presidential visits or meetings, not the place where former aides who have resigned in a scandal sit. This was mercy personified in a way difficult even to describe.

We spent about fifteen or twenty minutes together, reliving many remarkable moments from the previous two administrations. This time together sealed our friendship as brothers in Christ, and I asked if I might say a short prayer for him, the First Lady, and the Bush family. We prayed together.

Before I departed, I glanced around that majestic office for what I thought was one last time: the matching blue- and gold-striped chairs in front of the fireplace where we just sat; the luminous rug the First Lady designed with the presidential seal near the president’s desk; the gold curtains framing the three floor-to-ceiling windows with flags unfurled nearby; the two beautiful paintings on either side of those windows, one of them “A Charge to Keep” by artist W. H. D. Koerner whose title was taken from the president’s favorite hymn; the large Palladian door topped by the famous white shell leading to the Rose Garden; the Remington statue of the horseman on the table below the painting of the Texas fields alive with bluebells; the fresh flowers on the coffee table in front of the matching couches; the two great portraits dominating the room of Washington, looking upward to the left in confidence about the future of America, and of Lincoln; the elegant, graceful grandfather clock to the left of the president’s chair; and at both the Churchill and Eisenhower busts, the former next to the fireplace and the latter to the left of the president’s desk. To me this was sacred ground, and I felt overwhelmed.

We embraced. I told him I loved him and the First Lady, that it had been the professional honor of a lifetime to serve him and the country, and that I would never forget all he had done for me and my family. I told him he and his family would remain in my daily prayers without fail. Even as I was saying this, the refrain of Jesus’ words, “Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven” (Matt. 9:2 niv) kept going through my mind. I was in a state of semi-disbelief over what just transpired.

As I headed to the door, I was certain I would never see him again. It was a bittersweet exit. I choked up and knew this was the ending of something significant in my life. 

Only, it was not the end. It was the end of the beginning.

“Tim,” he said, “I would like you to bring Jenny and your two sons here to the Oval Office so I can tell them what a great husband and father you are.” 

“Pardon me, sir?” I was stunned by this added note of unfettered grace. He wanted to affirm me in front of my wife and sons. And I heard from his scheduler two days later for an appointment to come back to the Oval Office.

The forgiveness he modeled to me that day was rooted in the forgiveness in his own life, dating from 1986, when he decided to give up drinking for good, forever swearing off alcohol, and recommitting to faith in “the Almighty,” as he called God most frequently.

When we arrived as a family to see the president the following week, both of our boys were in their blue blazers, rep ties, and khaki pants. We waited in the Roosevelt Room, the president’s conference room across the hall from the Oval Office. Jenny and I told the boys that when the door to the Oval opened, they were to look the president in the eyes, firmly shake his hand, and thank him for seeing us. On cue the young aide arrived and escorted us across the hall—both Josh and Barry joined us this time with the president. When the door opened, the president looked at my boys and said, “I’ll bet before you came in, your parents told you to look me in the eyes, shake my hand, and tell me how nice it is to be here today, right?” There was spontaneous laughter, and a wonderful family time with the president ensued. He gave each boy presidential gifts; photos were snapped; hugs all around and handshakes; we departed in a daze of gratitude. 

We thought a giant chapter in our lives had ended and looked around one more time at the White House and its remarkable grandeur and history. All the people who meant so much to us on a day-by-day basis in the Bush administration, we thought, would become part of our memory.

Only that is not what happened.

We were not forgotten; we were not shunned; we were not cut off; our friendships continued; our sense of belonging continued in a healthy way outside of work relationships; we witnessed faith in action repeatedly on the part of former colleagues, none more so than from my professional family in the Office of Public Liaison at the White House. All three of the former directors—Lezlee Westine, Rhonda Keenum, and Julie Cram—reached out to our family and showed us pure love and friendship. As a family we were invited to Andrews Air Force Base for the president’s final departure from office in January 2009, and the emotional bonding that took place there sealed our friendships for a lifetime. It was all undeserved; the peace and reconciliation that flowed from the president’s heart pervaded my former colleagues’ hearts too.

I knew I had one more difficult apology to make. I did not want to make this apology by e-mail or phone or fax or letter; I wanted to make it in person, man to man. I knew I would be in Fort Wayne later in the year and made an appointment to meet the executive editor of The News-Sentinel, Kerry Hubartt. I betrayed him and the editorial page editors of his newspaper who were valued friends through the years, none more so than Leo Morris, the page’s editor, and Kevin Leininger, a columnist and a former editor on the opinion page. I made a plan to meet Kerry for coffee, and what ensued was yet another remarkable session of grace. I offered my categorical and unconditional apology for what I had done, and I told him I took full responsibility. I asked for his forgiveness, which he offered unconditionally.

Small demarcations of God’s grace continued to unfold in the months after I left the White House, none more important to me than when a man I knew professionally, a fellow Christian, reached out to me and invited me to join him “and three other friends” for coffee “just to talk about how you are doing.” That circle of four men turned out to be the most important time of healing and confession of my life; we met every other week for a year. They counseled me, prayed with me, allowed me to open myself up in a way that made me vulnerable; but it was the greatest form of ministry and healing I have ever experienced. Though they all lived in Washington at that time, one by one, with a single exception, they moved to other parts of the country; but I remain in regular touch with them; and the bonds of our friendship are immutable. 

What I have found is a joyful peace having passed through that furnace of public disgrace, where I discovered the most holy grace possible. It is as if God worked through me for years and then in one horrid moment allowed me to be stripped of worldly masks, reformed, and moved to an image closer to His. A friend of mine wrote to me: “You were formed in the fire just as surely as metal is cased in a foundry.” Every Christian experiences rebirth, and the process of grace must be attendant. My sin was real, and only through apology, atonement, and learning from it could I find a way forward.

Another friend wrote to me: “God doesn’t give us our due penalty for our sins but rather takes them on Himself and instead gives us beauty for ashes.” That moved me to tears. I know from my own experience that if a rebel returns to Him with a penitent heart, giving up the claims of self-ownership, He redeems everything. I have shared with anyone who will listen that conceit and arrogance are inimical to the life of a Christian, that humility of spirit is liberating and leads to the heart of God.

I worked for President Bush from the first campaign in 2000 until my resignation in early 2008. The grace he showed me upon that exit was a reflection of his faith in Jesus Christ. It was also a deep reflection of who the man really is. His grace set me out on a journey of recovery, where I found healing and peace as a result. His grace was an extension of a casual, warm, earthy, companionable, and self-effacing man who always understood that power is ephemeral, the source of his genuine humility.