W. Mark Felt

W. Mark Felt, second in command at the FBI in the early 1970s, now claims to have been Bob Woodward's Watergate source "Deep Throat." 

Felt and Edward S. Miller, "convicted of authorizing illegal break-ins during the Nixon years", were pardoned by President Ronald Reagan, who claimed "they served the nation 'with great distinction'. (4/15/1981)." 

Vanity Fair Interview
Now 91, Felt "says he was the source called Deep Throat who leaked secrets about President Nixon's Watergate coverup to The Washington Post. ... [Felt] kept the secret even from his family until 2002, when he confided to a friend that he had been Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward's source," Vanity Fair reported Tuesday, May 31, 2005. 

Read the Vanity Fair Press Room Advance Copy of "I'm the Guy They Called Deep Throat."

Denial 1999
In July 1999, David Daley of the Hartford Courant "found W. Mark Felt, the former FBI associate director believed by the late Richard Nixon and various other people to have been Deep Throat." Daley asked Felt, then 85 and living in California, if he was "Deep Throat," to which Felt replied:


 * "'No, it's not me, ... I would have done better. I would have been more effective. Deep Throat didn't exactly bring the White House crashing down, did he?"

"Candidate" 2002
"Mark Felt: The former FBI official is considered a leading candidate. White House tapes from 1972 recorded Nixon aide H.R. Haldeman telling the president that most of the leaks were coming from Felt. Also, the Hartford Courant newspaper reported that a 19-year-old it interviewed in 1999 said Bernstein's son Jacob had told him that Felt was Deep Throat. Bernstein and his ex-wife, Nora Ephron, deny he ever told his son." CNN, June 17, 2002.