Walter Wilson Jenkins, the son of John and Enna Jenkins, was born in Jolly, Texas, on 23rd March, 1918. Jenkins did well at school and went on to study at the University of Texas.

In 1939 Lyndon B. Johnson approached the dean and asked him to recommend a student to work for him in Congress. The dean suggested Jenkins and he began work for Johnson soon afterwards. As he later recalled, at his first his main role was "answering mail and filling constituents' requests for farming pamphlets". Johnson was impressed with Jenkins and by 1941 he was involved in dealing with leading figures in the government such as Harold Ickes. This included information that was "too sensitive to be broached over the telephone."

Jenkins also played an important role in collecting money from Washington lobbyists for Johnson's election campaigns. On one occasion he was given $15,000 in small bills. He later recalled "I went down to Texas carrying this money in bills stuffed into every pocket." He also dealt with members of the Suite 8F Group such as George Brown and Herman Brown (Brown & Root), Jesse H. Jones (Reconstruction Finance Corporation), Gus Wortham (American General Insurance Company) and James Abercrombie (Cameron Iron Works).

In his book Lyndon Johnson: Master of the Senate, Robert A. Caro claims that cash was collected by Jenkins, Bobby Baker, Edward A. Clark or Clifford Carter in Texas and then brought to Johnson in Washington. Caro quotes Clark as saying that Johnson always wanted contributions given outside the office.

Lyndon B. Johnson also used Jenkins to obtain political information. He told Jenkins that it was very important to "read" politicians. He constantly told him: "Watch their hands, watch their eyes. Read eyes. No matter what a man is saying to you, it's not important as what you can read in his eyes. The most important thing a man has to tell you is what he's not telling you. The most important thing he has to say is what he's trying not to say." Bobby Baker was another one who got this advice. He later recalled: "He seemed to sense each man's individual price and the commodity he preferred as coin."

Jenkins was also responsible for collecting advertising money for the KTBC. This was a radio and television station in Austin, that was officially owned by Lady Bird Johnson. This became a great source of income for the Johnson family after the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) had granted KTBC 24 hour a day monopoly broadcasting rights.

It was because of his work with KTBC that Jenkins became involved in the Don B. Reynolds scandal. Reynolds was a friend of Bobby Baker, who was at this time working for Lyndon B. Johnson. In 1957 Reynolds was asked to arrange Johnson's life insurance policy.

In 1963 Senator John Williams of Delaware began investigating the activities of Baker. As a result of his work, Baker resigned as the secretary to Lyndon B. Johnson on 9th October, 1963. During his investigations Williams met Reynolds and persuaded him to appear before a secret session of the Senate Rules Committee.

Don B. Reynolds told B. Everett Jordan and his committee on 22nd November, 1963, that Johnson had demanded that he provided kickbacks in return for him agreeing to this life insurance policy. This included a $585 Magnavox stereo. Reynolds was also told by Jenkins that he had to pay for $1,200 worth of advertising on KTBC, Johnson's television station in Austin. Reynolds had paperwork for this transaction including a delivery note that indicated the stereo had been sent to the home of Johnson.

Reynolds also told of seeing a suitcase full of money which Bobby Baker described as a "$100,000 payoff to Johnson for his role in securing the Fort Worth TFX contract". His testimony came to an end when news arrived that President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated.

Throughout these hearings, the Republican members of the repeatedly tried to have Walter Jenkins called as a witness. As Carl Curtis pointed out: "Jenkins had been employed by Johnson for years. It was well established that he had handled many of Johnson's business concerns. The information given to the Committee by Reynolds clearly conflicted with the memorandum to which Jenkins had subscribed... Why did these six prominent Democratic senators, several of them leaders of their party, vote against hearing and cross-examining Jenkins?"

The historian, Rick Perlstein argued in Before the Storm: "In late January (of 1964) when Republicans tried to get Walter Jenkins, Johnson's most intimate aide, to testify before a Senate subcommittee investigation, Johnson put in the fix. Two psychiatrists appeared to testify that an appearance would - literally - kill him. Carl Curtis moved to call Jenkins to the stand anyway. He lost 6-3 in a party line vote.... Curtis lost again when he moved to make the record of the session public."

Abe Fortas, a lawyer who represented both Lyndon B. Johnson and Bobby Baker, worked behind the scenes in an effort to keep this information from the public. Johnson made threats against Carl Curtis, John Williams and Hugh Scott, who were all calling for Johnson to be fully investigated for corruption. In a telephone conversation with George Smathers on 10th January, 1964, Johnson told him that there was a tape that showed that Williams and Scott were involved in some sort of corrupt activity. Johnson also asks Smathers to arrange for Richard Russell and Everett Dirksen to deal with Curtis.

Lyndon B. Johnson also arranged for a smear campaign to be organized against Don B. Reynolds. To help him do this J. Edgar Hoover passed to Johnson the FBI file on Reynolds. Johnson then leaked this information to Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson. On 5th February, 1964, the Washington Post reported that Reynolds had lied about his academic success at West Point. The article also claimed that Reynolds had been a supporter of Joseph McCarthy and had accused business rivals of being secret members of the American Communist Party. It was also revealed that Reynolds had made anti-Semitic remarks while in Berlin in 1953.

A few weeks later the New York Times reported that Lyndon B. Johnson had used information from secret government documents to smear Don B. Reynolds. It also reported that Johnson's officials had been applying pressure on the editors of newspapers not to print information that had been disclosed by Reynolds in front of the Committee on Rules and Administration.

Don B. Reynolds also testified before the Rules Committee on 9th January, 1964. This time Reynolds provided little damaging evidence against Johnson. As Reynolds told John Williams after the assassination: "My God! There's a difference between testifying against a President of the United States and a Vice President. If I had known he was President, I might not have gone through with it." Maybe there were other reasons for this change of approach.

Jenkins had been saved from exposure. However, on 7th October, 1964, Jenkins went to cocktail party at the Washington offices of Newsweek. On his way home he visited the YMCA toilet. While there he was arrested by the police after being found having sex with a retired soldier. A local newspaper reporter working for the Washington Star, found out about this incident. He also discovered that Jenkins had been arrested on a similar charge in 1959. The offence had taken place in the same YMCA toilet.

Lyndon B. Johnson applied considerable pressure on the newspaper not to print the story. Johnson pointed out that Jenkins was happily married with six children and that the incident was a result of Jenkins having too much to drink at the party. Johnson recruited his personal lawyer, Abe Fortas, to deal with the newspaper editor. However, the story eventually appeared in the Washington Star and Jenkins was forced to resign.

When he heard the news about Jenkins, J. Edgar Hoover sent Jenkins a bouquet of flowers and expressed his regret that he had lost his job. As Anthony Summers points out in his book, Official and Confidential: "J. Edgar Hoover's public attitude on homosexuality was normally at least condemnatory, often cruel. On this occasion, however, he visited Jenkins in the hospital and sent him flowers."

Members of Congress called for the FBI to carry out an investigation into the Jenkins case. Several were concerned that the FBI had been unaware of Jenkins previous offence in the same Washington toilet six years earlier. It also emerged that Jenkins, a colonel in the Air Force Reserve, had tried to use his influence to reinstate a fellow officer dismissed for sex offences.

When the FBI report was eventually published it stated that Jenkins had only "limited association with some individuals who are alleged to be, or who admittedly are, sex, deviates... but there was no information that Jenkins had ever engaged in improper acts with them". The report concluded that Jenkins "had never compromised national security".

After leaving Washington, Jenkins worked as a management consultant and ran a construction company in Austin, Texas. He remained close to the Lyndon B. Johnson family for the rest of his life.

Walter Wilson Jenkins died on 23rd November, 1985.

 

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