VIDEO: U.S. Senator Whitehouse Won’t Quit All-White Exclusive Private Club
GoLocal News Team
VIDEO: U.S. Senator Whitehouse Won’t Quit All-White Exclusive Private Club
In 2006, when Whitehouse ran for the United States Senate, he reportedly promised to quit his memberships in Bailey's, as well as the all-male, all-white Bellevue Avenue Reading Room.
However, eleven years later, a GoLocal investigation has uncovered that Whitehouse has consolidated his ownership with his wife in Bailey's, one of America’s oldest and most exclusive beach clubs.
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After weeks of refusing to answer GoLocal’s questions about his membership in Bailey’s — Nagle caught up with Whitehouse attending an event in Newport.
“I think it would be nice if they (Bailey’s Beach Club) changed a little bit, but it's not my position,” Whitehouse told Nagle.
When asked if he would pressure the club to push for diversity at the all-white club], Whitehouse said, “I will take that up privately.” He then told Nagle he had no further comment and walked away.
Bailey’s Beach Club is not and average private club -- it has been described as the most exclusive club in America.
The New York Times wrote about the club more than a decade ago…’’People kill to belong to the beach,'' said Beth Pyle, whose twin sister, she added, has never quite made it into the club. 'It has really driven some people crazy when they don't get in.''
For Whitehouse and his wife Sandra Thornton, Bailey’s is a way of life -- an insular enclave away from Rhode Island and the rest of the world.
The GoLocal investigation found that the Whitehouses have extended the club connections to others. Vivian Spencer, another Bailey’s lifer, is now a member of Whitehouse’s Senate staff.
Politicians and "White Only" Clubs
Politicians’ ties to exclusionary organizations have come under scrutiny for years.
In 2006, Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy severed his ties with the all-male Owl club which he joined while at Harvard University — after he had blasted Judge and Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito Jr. for having joined a conservative group called “Concerned Alumni of Princeton,” that had wanted the university to remain all-male.
The late U.S. Senator John H. Chafee would not be a member of all-male or all-white clubs.
Whitehouse and his wife Sandra own multiple properties, including a $2.7 million, 6 bedroom house off of Ocean Drive in Newport — less than a quarter mile from Bailey's Beach.