What Really Happened

by Rielle Hunter

  After Oklahoma, I remember being in Minnesota, along on Johnny’s never-ending quest to try to get every Democrat elected, and then driving to Iowa. It was a long drive that began the moment Johnny got off the stage after a large speaking event. After Johnny spoke he would have a post-performance high, which sometimes triggered his belief that the crowd was in love with him and oh, what a great man I am! Of course, some of the staff didn’t have any understanding that this was just a “performance high” reaction and reacted bitterly, resenting his egotistical behavior and the fact that he ignored them. Naturally, all of this went unspoken, but on that occasion it did make for a very uncomfortable, very long car ride.

  Somewhere during that ride, Kim Rubey, the very intelligent, extremely dry-witted PAC communications director, noticed my pearl bracelet and said, “I like your bracelet.” I believed that she knew the second she saw it that it was from Johnny. She had just been at the Ponderosa (which is what Johnny and I call his house in Chapel Hill) for something, probably for one of the many People photo shoots, and I assumed she had seen whatever Johnny had bought for Emma, which he had said was similar to my bracelet. Anyway, it was clear to me—she knew.

  Later that night, we were all eating at Centro in Des Moines and Newt Gingrich was in the restaurant, so the subject of infidelity came up. Mudcat Saunders, who was with us, went off on it. He had zero tolerance for infidelity, whereas Kim defended it. Of course Johnny and I didn’t say a word but we were both surprised by Kim’s response. She spoke as someone with a great deal of understanding of the complexities of marriage. We both wondered, because we knew nothing of her personal life, if she had some sort of personal experience with infidelity.

  On our next outing (go Democrats go), Johnny, Josh, Sam, and I flew privately to Montana. We stopped in Salina, Kansas, for fuel, and oh no, our plane broke. Thank God it broke while we were parked on the ground! After we spent many hours waiting inside the FBO, the repair crew finally realized that it couldn’t get the part before the next morning. So Josh charmed the FBO personnel and got us a courtesy car. When Josh pulled around the building to pick us up, everyone started laughing. It looked exactly like a car from a junkyard. It was amazing to us that the car actually worked.

  We piled into our no-A/C, far-from-luxurious car and sputtered down the road to the Courtyard by Marriott, laughing most of the way. Josh then spent the next few hours trying to locate a way out of there, hoping to make it to the scheduled event in Montana. Josh spent much of his time being a travel agent, trying to locate planes from donors and/or commercial flights. In the second webisode, as he was filling out his job description for his visa application to China, he didn’t know what to write, and suggested his title should be Political Mastermind, or just Bitch.

  It was during this little layover in Salina that Johnny told me that he informed Josh that he took care of his “issue” with me. I assume what Josh thought happened was that Johnny ended his relationship with me and valued Josh’s opinion. But what actually happened was that Johnny ignored everything Josh had to say because he felt it was none of Josh’s business.

  I also remember watching the Lieberman nomination drama unfolding on TV with Josh and Sam. I stopped by Johnny’s room only to get into a fight with him over his “other woman” cell phone, which had a text on it from another woman. I didn’t read the text, but I threw his phone across the room and stomped out. (Yeah, that will show him!)

  Around August 17th I had to strongly pitch—actually, almost argue with—Nick Baldick about going to Connecticut to follow Johnny when he met with Ned Lamont. Nick didn’t want me to go, but I already had a lot of great footage about this Lieberman/Lamont issue. I ended up going, but the webisode Where’s the Party? (the one with Fred that I loved) never saw the light of day.

  While still in Connecticut, I got really pissed off again about Johnny’s cell phone. I read a text from the same old girlfriend (the one he spoke to on the phone next to me months ago) who clearly wanted to take their relationship back to more than friends. I was fed up with that phone. Without it, the other women would have no way to reach him. I was determined to replace it. This, of course, happened after dinner (and lots of wine). We had all gone out to dinner, and I remember the dinner fondly because Matt Giobbi was there, whom I called Advance Matt. He was in the second webisode. Matt was great at his job and took it so seriously. There was something so earnest, honest, and humorous about his mannerisms that just seeing him made me laugh. Johnny was also very fond of Matt. (I think this was in part because the mere sight of Matt cracked me up and Johnny loved it when I laughed.) I think Matt liked having me around because ever since I had joined the team, the senator loved eating with the staff, and the staff all loved eating out with him.

  At the end of August, Johnny invited me to fly to North Carolina to shoot footage of his parents, Bobbie and Wallace, at the Ponderosa—his brand-new, ever-so-humble twenty-eight-thousand-square-foot house. I wanted to capture footage of his father, Wallace, because there was so much continual hype about Johnny being the son of a mill worker. I thought this could potentially be a comedy gold mine. I stayed at a Marriott; Johnny later came to visit for a few hours. He told me to take a cab to a clinic the next morning; he was going in order to get some of his vaccinations for Africa and suggested I should get my shots too. The next morning Johnny was late, which was not a shocking development. I believe Andrew had gotten lost—also not a shocking development. I had my camera on and was already getting my shots when Johnny walked in. As usual he lit up when he saw me, something I captured on camera. I turned it off, finished getting my shots, and then went outside. Johnny’s parents pulled up in their car. They had an appointment in the area and arranged to meet us there afterward. This was where I first met Johnny’s parents—in the parking lot of a health clinic. I remember Johnny telling Andrew to go ahead and pay for my shots as well, which I would later hear (as usual) became an issue with the PAC.

  After arriving at Johnny’s house, it turned out that Wallace and Bobbie were less than interested in talking on camera, even though Wallace allowed me to mic him as Johnny gave us a grand tour of his new home.

  Of course, the press turned Johnny’s large house, and overall lifestyle, into a campaign issue. It frustrated me that the campaign couldn’t turn this into “the guy from nothing is now living the American dream, able to afford four-hundred-dollar haircuts and million-dollar houses,” as opposed to “the hypocrite who says he is for poor people is living the high life.” I think the real reason they couldn’t turn it around is Johnny wasn’t actually proud of it—he was embarrassed by it. Otherwise he would have be able to get out in front of that story, speaking from the heart and with pride, saying, “Yeah, I built that house, all cash. I can afford it and my family deserves it and now I want to help all of you be successful as well.” In reality, he was judging himself for spending money like that. I know him very well and that house isn’t close to who he is, and yet he allowed it to happen. He didn’t stop Elizabeth from doing it.

  When Jack and Emma came home from school, I interviewed them both on camera in exchange for giving them five dollars cash and promising them I would never show anyone. I kept my word on that, although this was one of the tapes that “magically” disappeared out of my hatbox (more on this later).

  I remember Andrew being there the night after Bobbie and Wallace had gone home. Johnny, Andrew, the nanny’s husband, Jed, and I sat on the porch drinking wine. It was raining. After dinner with the kids and the nanny, Jed, Andrew, and one of the nanny’s girlfriends, Andrew drove me back to my hotel. Johnny didn’t visit that night. He fell asleep with Jack, in Jack’s room.

  The next morning I accompanied Andrew, Johnny, and some poverty woman who was really snotty to me to the University of North Carolina, where I shot some footage of Johnny speaking that ended up with lighting issues. Then I went with Andrew and Johnny to some office where I sat outside the offi
ce talking on the phone with my editor.

  The three of us then drove back to the Ponderosa. I flew out later that day, before Elizabeth returned to the house. Andrew drove me to the airport and before I left, I remember Johnny ribbing Andrew several times about his never wanting to go home. He clearly wasn’t doing any necessary work but he was still hanging around. In response, Andrew got very vocal about how he was not interested in going home. Apparently his wife was very bitchy. The more she bitched, the more he wanted to stay away and the more he stayed away, the more she bitched. It seemed that Johnny and he had a lot in common on the marital front.

  Back at home, Sam and I were gearing up for a trip to New Hampshire over Labor Day weekend. When I booked Sam for this trip, he informed me that he needed to get back to New York in order to shoot his documentary that he was codirecting. (The documentary, If a Tree Falls, was later nominated for an Academy Award.) But the staff was supposed to stay a day later and take a commercial flight home, while Johnny was to fly privately back that night. I told Johnny that Sam needed to get to New York and I obviously would prefer to stay with Johnny, not the staff, and I asked him to please take care of it. I don’t actually remember whether he ever addressed it with the PAC leaders or if I just ended up putting my foot down that Sam and I were flying back with him because Sam could not miss his workday. However the details of this silly drama played out, Sam and I ended up flying back with Johnny and Josh did not. And despite Josh’s little tizzy about this all that day, we really did miss Josh on the plane ride back to DC. Josh was a major pain-in-the-ass drama queen and whiner but he was also a really good guy with a great sense of humor.

  Andrew picked us up at an FBO near Dulles. He had driven from North Carolina to escort Johnny to Bunny Mellon’s the next morning. I believe this was the first time Johnny ever met Bunny, but in any case, this meeting was the first I heard of the two of them meeting. One weird thing I remember about that night: Andrew called me on my cell phone very late to ask me if I wanted to join him for a drink in the bar. I answered my cell (not from my own room) but believe me, the last thing in the world I wanted to do, especially after the workday I had just had, was to join Andrew Young in the bar. I declined and as I hung up, I wondered why he had called. I told Johnny that was Andrew on my cell and asked, “Why would Andrew ask me to join him for a drink so late at night?” Johnny gave me a look that told me he had less-than-zero interest in talking about Andrew Young. I briefly thought about how flirty Andrew was to me when he first met me back in June and that Johnny had warned him in a funny way when we got off the plane: hands off. Was he hitting on me now? It felt like he was, but it was late, I was exhausted, and I had already given it too much thought. I shrugged it off.

  Johnny spoke at some big union event in California in September, and I remember saying to him right before he went on, “I bet you drinks tonight that you can’t get through this speech without bashing Bush.” He said, “You’re on.” Of course, I won the bet. Somewhere in nearly every speech, he habitually slipped into automatic pilot, and he would go for the easy applause, how bad President Bush is and how great we Democrats are, and the crowd would go wild. So predictable. So boring.

  From there we went to California and then on to Las Vegas. It was my first trip to Vegas. Ever. Every time I vetoed Vegas as a destination, my friend Angela Janklow would say, “Vegas is the exact opposite of everything you are about.” She was right, but it was fun anyway. We stayed at the Paris Las Vegas. It was like an indoor Disneyland. After Johnny spoke that morning, we all stopped by some walk-in restaurant at the Paris, one of the many in the hotel lobby; Johnny was looking at salads. He turned and asked me if I was hungry. Not Josh, not Kim, just me. Josh had a huge reaction to this. Anger, sulking, back-handed comments. Poor Josh.

  From time to time, when I felt especially bad for him, and because I already knew that his days were numbered, I would offer Josh my unsolicited opinion, telling him that he was very talented, and perhaps better suited for a different job. Because my loyalty was to Johnny, I could never do more than hint at that. I felt sorry for him. From everything I could see, Johnny wasn’t ever going to be any nicer to him. That’s just life. I was the girlfriend; Josh was just the staffer.

  From Vegas, Johnny was going to fly to Chicago to do Oprah with Elizabeth, for her book Saving Graces. It was the first time they had done Oprah, and it was a very big deal. Once that I heard that Johnny was doing the show too, I was very upset about it every time it was mentioned. I really didn’t want the both of them to go on Oprah and lie to millions of people. I thought that he and Elizabeth should wait until they get to a place of honesty in their relationship, and then decide whether to go on Oprah and tell the millions of viewers about the journey. You don’t do the public stuff and lie. Don’t do it until you can be honest. Of course I shared my thoughts but come on, for a guy and his spouse who may actually run for the highest office in the land, do you know how many people watch Oprah?

  It still astounds me how naïve I was. Of course he went to Chicago and taped Oprah. I watched it and found the whole thing to be extremely sad—and extremely irritating.

  Toward the end of September, Johnny called me sounding very odd and detached, informing me that he wanted to talk to me later in person. He sounded strange, so I began mimicking his tone and what he was saying, so he could actually hear it. I believe he had gone to church on Sunday and had gotten some good old-fashioned Southern religion. Whatever the case, I got the feeling from his tone that he intended to end our relationship when we talked later in person.

  Johnny was set to come to New York to be on a panel at New York University for The New York Times, which Sam was going to shoot. I met everyone downtown in front of the building.

  Johnny was very odd that night and not at his best, which was not lost on any of us. Afterward Josh, Johnny, and Kim immediately got in the car and left while I was still upstairs. I thought that was so weird of Johnny to leave without asking me if I needed a lift uptown. Was this the end? How would I ever continue working with him if this were the end?

  So I got in a cab alone and headed uptown. I figured I’d just go to Serafina and wait for his call. I sat down at the bar and ordered a glass of wine, and who should pop in to get dinner for the senator? Josh. He was a bit freaked out that I was there. It really wasn’t that weird, given how often I ate at Serafina, which was in Glory Crampton’s neighborhood, but Josh didn’t know that and acted as though he had caught me doing something I shouldn’t be doing. Granted, I didn’t know that this was the restaurant Johnny would order from, but it was a place that I often went, so I didn’t act as though it was odd because it wasn’t.

  Josh and I chatted about how ineffectual Johnny had been on the panel. Josh said, “Yeah, no more panels for us.” He left and Johnny called. I went up to his room and we ate dinner together. He told me he wanted to end his relationship with me because he wanted to work on his marriage. Work on his marriage? Was that a joke? Like he and Elizabeth were finally going to enter therapy all of a sudden, all on his incentive? Despite my doubts, he insisted he really wanted to work on his marriage, so the only thing I could say was okay.

  I spent the night as though it was our last, and when I left in the morning, I remember looking at him from the door as I said goodbye, thinking that I’d never see him again.

  I went back to New Jersey and got into bed, where I stayed most of the day. My heart was broken. I had no idea how I would ever fulfill my contract nor did I want to think about it. I was experiencing way too much pain.

  Around 5 p.m. he called and asked, “How are you?”

  “Broken-hearted.”

  “Yeah, I feel it. I felt it all day. Do you want to come see me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Come on.”

  And that was it. I went back to the Regency.

  I think we both realized then that there was no way out of this
. We were madly in love.

  Two days before we left for Africa, I bought a new phone for myself—a pink Motorola RAZR with a Johnny Cash ringtone—and a black RAZR for Johnny that looked exactly like his work phone.

  I took a train to DC to spend the night with him and gave him his new phone. He finally got rid of the ex-mistress’s phone, which solved all our ex-mistress problems. Why it took me so long to do that, I have no idea. Maybe because every minute I wasn’t traveling, I was logging footage or editing. Or maybe I thought there was a chance our relationship wouldn’t survive long enough for it to matter. Johnny told me that he really wanted to move forward, without the ex-mistresses, without all the extra baggage. And now, without anyone having a way to reach him (minus one or two incoming calls to his home phone), we finally could.

  SEVEN

  The Leaves Are Changing

  “Never forget that the most powerful force on earth is love.”

  —Nelson Rockefeller

  The end of September 2006 I drove with Sam Cullman, my director of photography, out to John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. During the drive I got a call on my phone from Johnny’s work phone, but he hung up before I could answer it. Weird. When I arrived in the lounge to connect with our little traveling “Save Uganda” group, I learned what happened. Johnny couldn’t figure out where all his numbers had gone on his cell phone so he had handed the phone to Josh Brumberger. But it was the wrong phone—the cell I had just bought for him. Fortunately he realized what he had done before any damage was done.

  After everyone arrived, four folks from the International Rescue Committee (IRC) and five people from Team Edwards—Johnny, Josh, Derek Chollet (Johnny’s foreign policy guy), Sam, and I—all headed to our gate.

  Once on board, we were told that there was a problem with the plane and they were going to contact maintenance to fix it instead of deplaning us. That’s when the drinking began.