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Probe Continues One Year After Kitzhaber's Resignation

Gov. John Kitzhaber
Office of the Governor
Gov. John Kitzhaber

It's been one year since Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber resigned. The Democrat stepped down last February amid an influence peddling investigation.

Kitzhaber was the first Oregon governor to resign under pressure. It came just over a month into his record-setting fourth term. But reports swirled about the governor and his fiancée, Cylvia Hayes, possibly using state resources to help Hayes' private consulting firm.

Top legislative leaders and other public officials from his own party pressured the governor to step down, and on February 18, he did. One year later an ongoing federal criminal investigation has not produced any charges.

Pacific University political analyst Jim Moore said that doesn't mean Kitzhaber is out of the woods yet.

"It's clearly taking them a long time to go through that evidence and then figure out if there's something that's worth pursuing that might be criminal,” Moore said.

If the federal investigation results in no charges, Kitzhaber still faces separate probes by the Oregon Department of Justice and the Oregon Government Ethics Commission.

Kitzhaber was succeeded in the governor's office by then-Secretary of State Kate Brown. The Democrat is running this year to serve out the remaining two years of Kitzhaber's term.

Copyright 2016 Northwest News Network

Chris Lehman
Chris Lehman graduated from Temple University with a journalism degree in 1997. He landed his first job less than a month later, producing arts stories for Red River Public Radio in Shreveport, Louisiana. Three years later he headed north to DeKalb, Illinois, where he worked as a reporter and announcer for NPR–affiliate WNIJ–FM. In 2006 he headed west to become the Salem Correspondent for the Northwest News Network.