Editing Joseph McCarthy (section)

==Personal life==
In 1950, McCarthy assaulted journalist [[Drew Pearson (journalist)|Drew Pearson]] in the cloakroom at the [[Sulgrave Club]], reportedly kneeing him in the groin. McCarthy, who admitted the assault, claimed he merely "slapped" Pearson.<ref>
{{cite book|last = Herman
  |first = Arthur
  |title = Joseph McCarthy: Reexamining the Life and Legacy of America's Most Hated Senator
  |publisher = Free Press
  |year = 2000
  |page = [https://archive.org/details/josephmccarthyre00herm/page/233 233]
  |isbn = 0-684-83625-4
  |url = https://archive.org/details/josephmccarthyre00herm/page/233
  }}</ref> In 1952, using rumors collected by Pearson as well as other sources, Nevada publisher [[Hank Greenspun]] wrote that McCarthy was a frequent patron at the White Horse Inn, a Milwaukee gay bar, and cited his involvement with young men.  Greenspun named some of McCarthy's alleged lovers, including Charles E. Davis, an ex-Communist and "confessed homosexual" who claimed that he had been hired by McCarthy to spy on U.S. diplomats in [[Switzerland]].<ref>{{cite magazine |title=Memorandum of understanding about McCarthy and a besieged army |magazine=Life |date=March 8, 1954 |pages=28 |publisher=Time Inc}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Hersh |first1=Burton |title=Bobby and J. Edgar: The Historic Face-Off Between the Kennedys and J. Edgar Hoover that Transformed America |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gA6xmt1I2fYC|date=2007 |publisher=Carroll & Graf|isbn=978-0786731855 }}</ref>

McCarthy's [[FBI]] file also contains numerous allegations, including a 1952 letter from an Army lieutenant who said, "When I was in [[Washington, D.C.|Washington]] some time ago, [McCarthy] picked me up at the bar in the Wardman [Hotel] and took me home, and while I was half-drunk he committed [[sodomy]] on me." [[J. Edgar Hoover]] conducted a perfunctory investigation of the Senator's alleged [[sexual assault]]; Hoover's take was that "homosexuals are very bitter against Senator McCarthy for his attack upon those who are supposed to be in the Government."<ref>{{cite web |title=Joseph McCarthy FBI File, part 3 of 56 (part 2 of 28) |url=https://vault.fbi.gov/Sen.%20Joseph%20%28Joe%29%20McCarthy/Sen.%20Joseph%20%28Joe%29%20McCarthy%20Part%203%20of%2056/view |website=FBI Records: The Vault |access-date=February 14, 2022 |archive-date=February 14, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220214104133/https://vault.fbi.gov/Sen.%20Joseph%20(Joe)%20McCarthy/Sen.%20Joseph%20(Joe)%20McCarthy%20Part%203%20of%2056/view |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>[[C.A. Tripp]] also mentions this incident in his book ''[[The Homosexual Matrix]]''. Tripp describes McCarthy as "predominantly homosexual."</ref>

Although some notable McCarthy biographers have rejected these rumors,<ref>The allegation is specifically rejected in
{{cite book
|last = Rovere
|first = Richard H.
|title = Senator Joe McCarthy
|publisher = University of California Press
|year= 1959
|page = 68
|isbn = 0-520-20472-7}}</ref> others have suggested that he may have been blackmailed. Allegations against McCarthy not only involved accusations of homosexuality, but also inappropriate behavior towards young women, particularly after drinking. In his autobiography, [[Walter Trohan]] one of his close supporters at the time, stated that "he just couldn't keep his hands off young girls." and that the communists could have "plant[ed] a minor on him and raised the cry of statutory rape".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Trohan |first=Walter |title=Political Animals: Memoirs of a Sentimental Cynic |publisher=Double Day |year=1975 |edition=1st |pages=250}}</ref> [[Curt Gentry]], in his biography of Hoover, cited rumors among FBI employees that the director had a secret file containing affidavits of such conduct, including towards children younger than ten.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Gentry |first=Curt |title=J Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets |publisher=WW Norton & Co. |year=2001}}</ref> During the early 1950s, McCarthy launched a series of attacks on the [[CIA]], claiming it had been infiltrated by communist agents. [[Allen Dulles]], who suspected McCarthy was using information supplied by Hoover, refused to cooperate. According to the historian [[David Talbot]], Dulles also compiled a "scandalous" intimate dossier on the Senator's personal life and used the homosexual stories to take him down.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Talbot |first1=David |title=The Devil's Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the CIA, and the Rise of America's Secret Government |date=2015 |publisher=Harper}}</ref>

In any event, McCarthy did not sue Greenspun for [[libel]]. (He was told that if the case went ahead he would be compelled to take the witness stand and to refute the charges made in the [[affidavit]] of the young man, which was the basis for Greenspun's story.)

In 1953, he married Jean Fraser Kerr, a researcher in his office. In January 1957, McCarthy and his wife adopted an infant with the help of [[Roy Cohn]]'s close friend [[Cardinal (Catholic Church)|Cardinal]] [[Francis Spellman]]. They named the baby girl Tierney Elizabeth McCarthy.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Oshinsky |first1=David |title=A Conspiracy So Immense: The World of Joe McCarthy |date=2019 |publisher=Free Press}}</ref>