Nixon Vs. Ted Kennedy-Who needs a smoking gun? Here's the hot pants tape

WASHINGTON — On April 9, 1971, President Richard Nixon conferred with aides on how to get Ted Kennedy followed, or "covered," in hopes of catching the senator doing something scandalous.

Nixon, chief of staff H.R. Haldeman and press secretary Ron Ziegler seemed to think it would only be a matter of time because, as they saw it, Kennedys have affairs.

The taped conversation reflects on Kennedy's trouble at Chappaquiddick, when the young woman in his car drowned after they went off a bridge into the water. And it drifts into his wife Joan's eye-popping outfit at a White House luncheon.

The exchange:

Nixon: "There oughta be a way to get him covered. ... The reason I would cover him is from a personal standpoint — you're likely to find something on that."

Haldeman: "He's covered on that."

Nixon: "You're sure?"

Haldeman: "Pretty much."

Nixon: "You watch. I predict something more is going to happen."

Haldeman: "They're keeping an eye on the family. I meant in _"

Nixon: "I mean, it's a matter of judgment. I mean, he's just gotta _"

Haldeman: "Did you see his wife came here at the White House again — crazy outfit...."

Nixon: "What did she wear?"

Haldeman: "Some leather gaucho, with a bare midriff or something."

Ziegler: "Well, no, they put on a body stocking which is flesh tone."

Haldeman: "Oh, is that it?"

Ziegler: "And then they wrap the leather gaucho type thing around it. So you look at it from a distance, and you think my God, there she is."

Haldeman: "She was going to wear hot pants but Teddy told her she couldn't."

Ziegler: "They're weird people, they really are. I mean, even the _"

Nixon: "It's crude. What the hell's the matter with them? What's she trying to prove?"

Haldeman: "Whatever it is, she ain't gaining many votes, because they've got — the super-swinger, jet-set types are going to be for them and not for you no matter what happens."

Ziegler: "The super-swingin' jet-set types don't even relate to that type thing. It's a very, very small group."

Haldeman: "Middle American folk, that's desecration of the White House to most Americans ..."

Ziegler: "She has to have some sort of hang-up herself personally. She knows what Teddy was doing out there with that girl, running her into the water, you know, and what he's been doing."

Haldeman: "But that family's used to that."

Nixon: "They do it all the time."

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