Deep Throat (Watergate)
On the 17th of June 1972, police arrested five men inside the offices of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate Complex. They carried $2,300 in cash and plastic gloves to prevent fingerprints. Burglary tools filled their pockets alongside a walkie-talkie capable of listening to police frequencies. Cameras held forty rolls of film for potential evidence gathering. Tear gas guns sat ready among multiple electronic devices intended for planting. Notebooks contained the telephone number of White House official E. Howard Hunt. One man was James W. McCord Jr., a former Central Intelligence Agency employee serving as security for Nixon's Committee for the Re-Election of the President. This group became notoriously mocked with the acronym CREEP.
Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward pursued the story for two years following the break-in. The scandal eventually implicated many members of Nixon's White House staff. It culminated in Richard Nixon becoming the first United States president to resign from office. Woodward and Bernstein wrote in All the President's Men that key information came from an anonymous informant they dubbed Deep Throat. The book introduced misdeeds of the Nixon administration to the general public. The scandal led to prison terms for White House Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman. G. Gordon Liddy received a sentence along with Egil Krogh and Charles Colson. Former Attorney General John N. Mitchell served time while John Dean and John Ehrlichman also faced imprisonment. A film based on the book released two years later won four Academy Awards out of eight nominations.
Woodward claimed he would signal Deep Throat by moving a flowerpot with a red flag on his apartment balcony. When Deep Throat wanted a meeting, he made special marks on page 20 of Woodward's copy of The New York Times. He circled the page number and drew clock hands to indicate the hour. They often met at 2:00 a.m. on the bottom level of an underground garage just over the Key Bridge in Rosslyn. The garage is located at 1401 Wilson Boulevard and has a historical marker erected in 2011. They met six times between October 1972 and November 1973. Adrian Havill investigated these claims for his 1993 biography and found them factually impossible. He noted that Woodward's apartment 617 at 1718 P Street Northwest faced an interior courtyard not visible from the street. Copies of The New York Times were delivered in unaddressed stacks to building reception desks. Woodward stated the courtyard was once an alleyway before being bricked off. His balcony remained visible to passing pedestrians during the early 1970s. Felt's wife recalls answering Woodward's telephone calls for him.
Deep Throat's identity remained unconfirmed for over thirty years despite widespread public curiosity. George V. Higgins wrote in 1975 that Mark Felt knew more reporters than most journalists did. Some thought he had borrowed a Washington Post alias from a dirty movie. J. Anthony Lukas speculated Felt was Deep Throat in his book Nightmare: The Underside of the Nixon Years published in 1976. He based this on three New York Times Sunday Magazine articles but faced wide criticism. Timothy Noah called Felt the best guess going about the identity of Deep Throat in 2002. A grand jury convened by Assistant Attorney General John Stanley Pottinger investigated illegal break-ins Felt authorized against dissident groups. A juror asked Felt out of the blue if he was Deep Throat while testifying. Felt went white with fear when confronted directly. Ronald Kessler reported in August 2001 that Joan Felt told him Woodward visited their Santa Rosa home unexpectedly in summer 1999. Their meeting appeared to be more of a celebration than an interview. Woodward confirmed Felt was Deep Throat in 2005 after decades of denial.
On the 31st of May 2005, Vanity Fair reported that Felt then aged ninety-one claimed to be the man once known as Deep Throat. Later that day, Woodward, Bernstein, and Bradlee released a statement through The Washington Post confirming the story was true. On the 2nd of June 2005, The Washington Post ran a lengthy front-page column by Woodward detailing his friendship with Felt before Watergate. Woodward first met Felt by chance in 1970 when he was a Navy lieutenant in his mid-twenties. He was dispatched to deliver a package to the White House's West Wing. Felt arrived soon after for a separate appointment and sat next to Woodward in the waiting room. They struck up a conversation and eventually learned of Felt's position in the upper echelon of the FBI. Woodward asked for Felt's phone number and kept in touch with him. After joining The Washington Post in August 1971, Felt began passing pieces of information to Woodward. The first time Woodward used information from Felt in a Washington Post story was in mid-May 1972. A month later just days after the break-in, Woodward called Felt at his office about Watergate.
Felt's family called him an American hero stating he leaked information for moral and patriotic reasons. Other commentators speculated Felt may have had more personal reasons for leaking information to Woodward. Woodward described Felt as a loyalist to and admirer of J. Edgar Hoover. After Hoover's death, Felt became angry and disgusted when L. Patrick Gray was appointed Director over him. Gray was a career naval officer and lawyer with no law enforcement experience. Felt was particularly unhappy with Gray's management style which differed markedly from Hoover's. He aided Woodward because he knew him personally having met years before when Woodward served in the navy. Instead of seeking prosecutors or the House Judiciary Committee, Woodward methodically solicited Felt to guide their investigation while keeping identity concealed. Some conservatives like Pat Buchanan castigated Felt asserting Nixon was unfairly hounded from office. They often claimed it a witch hunt. Woodward wrote that Felt believed he was protecting the bureau by finding a way to push information out to the public. He had nothing but contempt for the Nixon White House and their efforts to manipulate the Bureau for political reasons.
Hal Holbrook portrayed Deep Throat in the film adaptation of All the President's Men released in 1976. He uttered the catchphrase Follow the money though this phrase did not appear in the book. In the video game Metal Gear Solid released in 1998, the character Grey Fox uses the codename Deepthroat to provide advice to Solid Snake. The comedy film Dick revealed Deep Throat as two teenage Washingtonian girls working as Nixon's dog walkers. A spy thriller film titled Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House released in 2017 featured Liam Neeson portraying Mark Felt. Jenna Ortega made a remark about a wannabe Deep Throat in Episode 6 of Wednesday in 2022. Mike and Tony were jokingly referred to as Woodward and Bernstein in Dazed and Confused prompting one to retort about being Deep Throat. Fox Mulder used similar techniques to communicate with an informant named Deep Throat in The X-Files. Roger the Alien adopted a persona based on Deep Throat in American Dad. Karen claimed she leaked information to Woodward and Bernstein in Will & Grace. Gaspode the dog referred to himself as Deep Bone while acting as an anonymous source in The Truth by Terry Pratchett.
Common questions
Who was the real identity of Deep Throat in the Watergate scandal?
Mark Felt served as the anonymous informant known as Deep Throat during the Watergate investigation. He was a former FBI Associate Director who provided critical information to Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward.
When did Mark Felt officially reveal he was Deep Throat?
Vanity Fair reported on the 31st of May 2005 that Mark Felt claimed to be the source. The Washington Post confirmed his identity later that same day with a joint statement from Woodward, Bernstein, and Ben Bradlee.
Where did Woodward meet Deep Throat for their secret conversations?
Woodward met Mark Freet at an underground garage located at 1401 Wilson Boulevard just over the Key Bridge in Rosslyn. They conducted six meetings between October 1972 and November 1973 often at 2:00 a.m. on the bottom level of this facility.
How long after the Watergate break-in did it take to identify Deep Throat?
The identity of Deep Throat remained unconfirmed for over thirty years following the initial burglary on the 17th of June 1972. Public curiosity persisted until Mark Felt revealed himself in 2005 after decades of denial.
Why did Mark Felt leak information about the Nixon administration to journalists?
Felt leaked information because he believed he was protecting the FBI from political manipulation by the White House. He felt angry and disgusted when L. Patrick Gray replaced J. Edgar Hoover as Director and sought to push information out to the public through Woodward.