Dennis Hastert Dies, Was Somehow Not Dead This Whole Time

Well, time to do some research about his life.

Dennis Hastert, as a skeleton. Photo by Joseph Corl on Unsplash

Dennis Hastert, who for a long time was a big name in American politics, apparently died over the weekend. He was 84.

Born in Illinois, Hastert worked as a teacher and a wrestling coach before making his way into politics. There, he spent decades as the longest-serving Republican House speaker before getting sentenced to 15 months in federal prison in 2016 for violating federal banking laws.

I told my editors I would write his obit, but I barely remember anything about 2016 besides “fake news” and fascism. Let’s see what that was all about — Jesus fucking Christ!

Apparently he had made millions of dollars in secret payments to cover up sexual misconduct with a male student. Then, at his sentencing, he admitted to, ugh, diddling teenaged boys. Jesus H. I had forgotten about this twisted-up freak until now, but only because even more twisted-up freaks have been appearing in the meantime.

Here’s what the sentencing judge had to say in 2016:

“The defendant is a serial child molester,” said Judge Thomas M. Durkin of Federal District Court, as Mr. Hastert sat impassively, often staring downward, hands crossed on his lap. He added, “Some actions can obliterate a lifetime of good works. Nothing is more stunning than having ‘serial child molester’ and ‘speaker of the House’ in the same sentence.”

Of course, in 2026, it’s kind of more like par for the course to have known serial diddlers as high-level political officials. But that’s what serial predators do, right? They try to acquire as much power over others as they can, so they can simply do whatever they want to us all and take whatever they like, with impunity. They’re the reason we have to have laws, and consequences. They can’t just fucking act right!

Hastert was not charged with sexual abuse because statutes of limitation for acts in the 1960s and 1970s had run out by the time he admitted it, of course. The judge noted at that time that punishment for such a conviction would have been far worse.

“If there’s a public shaming of the defendant because of the conduct he’s engaged in, so be it,” Judge Durkin said.

I’m a big fan of public shaming myself, and I have absolutely no problem speaking ill of the dead. Come and fucking haunt me, Republican ghosts. You’ll have to fight for space though, it’s already crowded with the ghosts of the rest of the Nazis and other perverts I’ve antagonized over the years and who I’ve been lucky enough to outlive, because I don’t give one single fuck about finding shared humanity with a bunch of diddlers and fascists and other creeps.

But back to Hastert, who abused his position of authority as a teacher and a wrestling coach in order to have dominion over the young people who trusted him and may have felt like they had no choice but to go along with his nasty groping, because he was the “adult in the room.”

Let’s see how that translated to his political career, as a Republican. Here’s what Politico reported at the time:

Just before his election as House speaker in 1999, Dennis Hastert spearheaded legislation to prevent use of the Internet to encourage sexual acts with children. As he often did, Hastert invoked his personal history “as a father and a person who has dealt with public schools for a long time” to urge passage.

“We must continue to be proactive warding off pedophiles and other creeps who want to take advantage of our children,” Hastert said, according to an account of an Internet forum he held in his congressional district.

Known among his colleagues as “the Coach,” Hastert cultivated a nice-guy image and man-of-the-people persona during his years on Capitol Hill….

The Coach. Oh my God. I bet the women around him figured it out immediately, but he didn’t seem to be much of a fan of women either, probably for that exact reason!

But that didn’t stop him from fashioning himself as a champion of anti-gay rights, by portraying gay men as … you know what I’m going to say, right? Sexual predators, of course, in an old trope that’s getting revived today against queer folks:

Meanwhile, the true example of a “super-predator” appears to have been former GOP House Speaker Dennis Hastert, a man who prosecutors now say molested at least 4 boys, including a 14-year-old and one who years later took his own life. Since the statute of limitations on those crimes, which took place decades ago, has expired, Hastert will only receive up to six months in jail on charges stemming from bank withdrawals of large sums of cash in violation of federal law, in what prosecutors say was for the purpose of “hush money.”

Worse yet, through the years, as he covered up the sexual assaults he committed as a wrestling coach back in Yorkville, Illinois, Hastert pushed policies and positions as a House member and as the Speaker of a far-right GOP majority from 1999 to 2007 that demonized gays in part by portraying gay men as sexual predators.

Ah yes, of course, the man who was making the choice to diddle children who trusted him did his absolute best to take the rights away from vulnerable groups in the United States, for years on end. Meanwhile, his Republican buddies who are still alive are doing that to trans people right this second. For the same reason? Well, we’ve seen how they protect the pedophiles in the Epstein Files.

I just wonder how many of Hastert’s colleagues in the American government knew about this all along and helped him cover it up because of their own nasty proclivities. Kind of makes you look at a lot of that creepy legislation they keep pushing about child marriage (AND A LOT OF OTHER THINGS) a little bit differently, eh?

(Sidenote: Did you know California just banned child marriage, like, last week? Gov. Goodhair finally fucking did it!)

And now I am going to go take a long, long, very hot shower, and wash this obit off myself.

Dennis Hastert: Dead at 84. I have nothing good to say about him. He fucked up a lot of lives very badly, deliberately, without much in the way of consequences until the end of his life, and now, like at least one of his victims, he’s dead.

Adios, fucko!