Rep. Forbes Loses Aides Over Switch to Democrats

WASHINGTON —  Saying he had betrayed them and their political party, virtually the entire staff of Rep. Michael P. Forbes of New York resigned Monday, two days after he defected from the Republican Party to become a Democrat.

Nearly a dozen Forbes aides, many angry and still stunned, unlocked the lawmaker’s darkened office Monday morning and deposited their identification tags, keys and resignation letters. They spoke to reporters and quickly left, closing the door behind them.

“As a good Republican, I can’t for the life of me fathom why he’d make this move,” said Brian Fauls, Forbes’ legislative director and aide to the congressman since his arrival in Congress in 1995.

“Unfortunately, it could have been better,” 21-year-old intern Kevin Daggs said of his experience with Forbes.

The event was witnessed by reporters, who had been contacted by the National Republican Congressional Committee, the GOP’s House political arm. Officials of the NRCC, which sent a television camera to record the event, denied that they had encouraged the mass resignation.

NRCC spokeswoman Jill Schroeder said the campaign committee has promised to put Forbes’ former aides on its payroll or help them find other jobs so that they do not have to work for a Democrat.