WatergateWatergate was one of the greatest political scandals in the United States. On June 17, 1972, five men were arrested for breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate complex in Washington, DC. E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy, who were employed by the Committee to Re-Elect the President, played a role in the scandal. Some people, such as journalist Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, thought that it was a possibility that there was a direct link between the burglars and Nixon. The burglars were sentenced on March 23, 1973. After a few months on July 16, 1973, Alexander Butterfield, a former White House staff member, testified that there were secret recordings of presidential conversations. On July 24, 1974, the Supreme Court ordered Nixon to hand over transcripts of the tapes. On August 5, Nixon supplied transcripts of the tapes that clearly implicated him in the cover-up. Nixon then announced his decision to resign on August 8, 1974. Vice President Gerald Ford then became President the next day. The Watergate scandal led to campaign finance reform legislation and other good government measures. The scandal fed into a growing disillusionment and lack of faith in government.
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