Two key figures in the Iran-Contra affair quietly married last month, nearly 40 years after the scandal rocked US politics and President Ronald Reagan’s administration.
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Oliver North, 81, married his former secretary Fawn Hall, 65, on Aug. 27 in Virginia, according to a copy of the marriage certificate obtained by CNN.
Reached by phone, North declined to comment, apart from quoting a line famously delivered by Clark Gable’s character in “Gone with the Wind.”
“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,” he told CNN.
North, a retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel, was a National Security Council staffer when he gained attention for his role in the Iran-Contra scandal. North was part of the twin schemes to sell weapons to Iran and then use proceeds to fund anti-communist rebels, known as the Contras, in Nicaragua.
Hall, North’s secretary, admitted to shredding damning documents related to the controversy. She snuck documents that possibly implicated North out of the White House complex by stuffing them in her clothing and shoes, and the two later overfed a paper shredder to the point of it jamming.
After the intertwining scandals were revealed in 1986, those involved defended their actions as necessary to secure the release of American hostages in the Middle East and said they facilitated Reagan’s anti-communist policy goals in Central and South America.
But the sales ran afoul of legislation that limited US government assistance to the Contras, an arms embargo against Iran, and Reagan’s previous assurances that the US would not negotiate with terrorists.
North was convicted in 1989 on three felony charges; the convictions were vacated shortly after. Hall was granted immunity from prosecution.
News of the marriage was first reported by journalist Michael Isikoff for SpyTalk, a Substack publication focused on national security issues.
After his convictions were vacated, North mounted an unsuccessful bid for a U.S. Senate seat in Virginia in 1994 and went on to become a conservative political commentator. He was named president of the National Rifle Association in 2018 before leaving less than a year later amid a power struggle with the organization’s chief executive, Wayne LaPierre. His first wife, Betsy, died last year.
Hall has largely stayed out of the public eye since the scandal. She was married to Danny Sugerman, manager of the rock band The Doors, from 1993 until his death in 2005.
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