More Details About Chris Lee's Lady

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Danielle Belton, a blogger with African-American community news and entertainment site TheLoop21, caught up with the woman who brought down New York Rep. Chris Lee after Gawker on Wednesday published her anonymous account of exchanging flirtatious e-mails with the married 46-year-old. The new report adds some details about her identity, which, knowing how these things work, likely won't stay secret for that long if she keeps doing interviews:

She's a professional, single and successful, 34-year-old African American woman, dating and socializing in "the diamond district." Her weekends are spent sharing cocktails in posh spots and chatting about the latest news and gossip with friends. Having lived in the area for eight years now, she's a regular scenester in D.C. nightspots and didn't feel like getting her name dragged into the fray. After all, the leggy-glamazon works in government. No need to potentially freak out her employers.

But truth is, she didn't know he was a congressman. After all, it had started out as a joke. She'd done the online dating scene. She'd done D.C.'s dating scene (which she described as abysmal) and lamented how so many men lied. About their height. About their jobs. About their age.

And about their marital status.

It seems Rep. Christopher Lee of New York had pulled three-out-of-four on her. At least his height seemed to match the media reports....

TheLoop21: What were you thinking as you realized he was in Congress?

Anonymous: First reaction was holy sh*t. Second was, he's probably done this before. Third was, he's married. Fourth was, oh my God he's 46-years-old.

[Lee had originally told Anonymous he was in his late 30s.]....

TheLoop21: Why do you think he resigned?

Anonymous: Probably a bigger picture. Emails were exchanged. Something bigger is going on in his background. You never get caught the first time.

TheLoop21: What's the lesson in all this?

Anonymous: The lesson is if you're going to do dirt, do it anonymously. People cheat everyday, but only dumb people get caught.


Read the full interview at TheLoop21.com.

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Garance Franke-Ruta is a senior editor covering national politics at The Atlantic. More

She was previously national web politics editor at The Washington Post, and has also worked at The American Prospect, The Washington City Paper, The New Republic and National Journal magazines. At The Prospect she won the 2007 Hillman Prize awarded to its group blog, "Tapped."

In 2006, she was fellow at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School in Cambridge, Mass., and in 2007, a summer fellow with The Iowa Independent, based in Des Moines, Iowa.

Garance has lectured at the Kennedy School, the Harvard Art Museums, Williams College, Wellesley College, Brandeis and Georgetown Universities, and taught in Georgetown's Master of Professional Studies in Journalism program. She also has made numerous appearances on national and regional television and radio programs.

Born in the South of France, Garance grew up in San Cristobal de las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico; New York City, New York; and Santa Fe, New Mexico. She has resided in Washington, D.C., since graduating from Harvard in 1997.

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