Are Newt's Past Infidelities Really News? His Former Colleague Says Yes

As ABC News considers when it will air any or all of the interview from Newt Gingrich's ex-wife Marianne, there are other folks stepping forward to talk about the alleged affairs of the former Speaker of the House. But is this news? One of his former colleagues thinks so.

Newt's former colleague of 16 years, Bob Dornan claims that a female member of his staff was targeted by Gingrich and pursued with such vigor that she eventually quit working for him. In a recent interview with 1170 KFAQ's Pat Campbell, the ex-Congressman also made some strong charges that paint Newt as a serial cheater and someone who was known for targeting the young and innocent women who were working on Capitol Hill.

Mr. Gingrich's daughters, Kathy Lubbers and Jackie Kushman, have written an open letter to ABC News about their father:

"We will not say anything negative about our father's ex-wife. He has said before, privately and publicly, that he regrets any pain he may have caused in the past to people he loves."

While the Gingrich girls have not asked for the interview to be delayed or even scrubbed, they have made the following statement:

“ABC News or other campaigns may want to talk about the past, just days before an important primary election, but Newt is going to talk to the people of South Carolina about the future– about job creation, lower taxes, and about who can defeat Barack Obama by providing the sharpest contrast to his damaging, extreme liberalism.  We are confident this is the conversation the people of South Carolina are interested in having.”

Curiously, a search for "Newt's ex-wife" on the ABC News website yielded very little about the story that's getting major air time on virtually every other news outlet:

However, when we searched the web, as ABCNews.com suggested, there were plenty of options.

Obviously, the candidate and his family are going to say that negative moments in their past should not be part of the campaign.

By the way, the Gingrich girls are also part of their father's campaign. Jackie regularly appears on Fox News on behalf of her father. They also released this video just before the end of last year. (The clip includes a story of Newt heroically jumping into icy water to save the family dog... an odd contrast to the 20-year-old story circulating last week, the one about Mitt Romney putting his dog on the roof of his car.)

How do you feel about making a candidate's personal history the center of attention in a campaign?

Do Newt's Old Affairs Matter

H/T - Pat Campbell of 1170am in Tulsa