CHICAGO, June 24 (UPI) -- If Illinois Republican U.S. Senate nominee Jack Ryan is still hoping allegations made by his actress ex-wife that he took her to sex clubs would blow over, he may be disappointed.
The handwriting is on the wall and Ryan reportedly is seeking an exit strategy.
Ryan has been uninvited to campaign events by Illinois Republican Party Chairman Judy Baar Topinka, who says Ryan lied to her when he said there was nothing embarrassing in his unsealed custody documents.
Ryan canceled a trip to Washington Thursday after U.S. House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert canceled a morning fundraiser. Hastert said he would not comment on the Ryan divorce documents until after he had a conversation with the candidate.
A Ryan campaign spokesman said Hastert had to attend a leadership breakfast at the White House but said Sen. Peter Fitzgerald, the one-term Republican Ryan wants to replace in the U.S. Senate, remained supportive of Ryan's candidacy. Ryan had planned to appear with Fitzgerald at a fundraiser headlined by Virginia Sen. George Allen, chairman of the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee.
A scheduled July 1 fundraiser in Springfield, Illinois' capital, also was postponed.
"He's reassessing," a Republican source told the Chicago Sun-Times. "Everything is on hold."
The 19 state GOP Central Committee members meet in Chicago Friday and Saturday and may seal Ryan's fate based on new polling conducted by the Illinois Republican Party after allegations in the couple's divorce file that Ryan tried to force his wife, actress Jeri Ryan, to have sex with him in public at sex clubs in New York, New Orleans and Paris.
Ryan called the allegations "ridiculous" in custody documents filed in 2000. He has not denied the charges since or publicly apologized. The couple divorced in 1999 and have a 9-year-old son.
A spokesman said Jeri Ryan wished Jack "the best of luck in his Senate campaign."
Ryan's story aired on the television show "Entertainment Tonight" Wednesday and was fodder for comedians Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien. Jeri Ryan, star of "Boston Public" and the syndicated series "Star Trek: Voyager" is standing by her allegations in the documents.
Conservative commentator Bill O'Reilly said Ryan is "toast."
The Sun-Times ran an editorial cartoon showing Ryan in a sex dungeon wearing a bowtie snapping a whip. In the caption, an elephant suspended in a hanging cage labeled "Illinois GOP" says, "Excuse me, Mr. Ryan ... but this is not my idea of a party!"
The sex club allegations won't play in Peoria.
Rep. Ray LaHood, a Peoria congressman, called for Ryan to step aside Monday when his custody papers were unsealed.
Ryan trailed Democrat Barack Obama by 22 points in the most recent public-opinion poll, and even if he can hold onto his conservative base he would need to attract new voters to be elected, and that's unlikely.
Ryan was the topic of the day on television stations. Several asked: Should Jack Ryan step down? in e-mail polls and "man on the street" interviews. People stopped randomly said if Ryan truly had his son's welfare at heart, as he said when he fought to stop the release of his custody documents, he should withdraw from the Senate race.
Calls and e-mail messages to Illinois GOP headquarters were running 10-to-1 against Ryan, WBBM-TV said.
DuPage County Republican Chairman Kirk Dillard said it's "virtually impossible" for Ryan to recover from the political damage of his divorce.
The handsome, 44-year-old, Ivy League-educated, multimillionaire former investment broker, who left the rarified financial world to teach in a predominately African-American Catholic high school, is making his first run for political office.
To many he was a "dream candidate," but that dream has turned into a bad one.
Businessman Blair Hull, another rich political novice, saw his big lead disappear days before the March 16 Democratic primary when details of his messy divorce, including allegations of spousal abuse, surfaced. Hull crashed and burned, and Obama, a Harvard-educated law professor and community organizer, won the nomination overwhelmingly.
While Republican Party leaders may wish Ryan would go away, as the winner of the primary they can't force him to quit.
"I'm not jumping up in the air for joy either," said Republican state Sen. Kirk Dillard in The Illinois Leader. He backed businessman Andrew McKenna in the primary. "These types of allegations hurt a candidate like Jack Ryan, who needs suburban woman and his conservative base."
The Ryan debacle is another blow to the Illinois GOP, which was rocked by the federal indictment of former Republican Gov. George Ryan, no relation, in December for racketeering and corruption.
Voters elected the first Democratic governor in 28 years in 2002 as allegations of bribery and corruption dogged Ryan. The state is expected to be in the Democratic column in the Nov. 2 presidential election -- good news for Obama, who could become the country's only African-American U.S. senator if elected.
The names of possible replacement Republican candidates include well-respected state Sen. Steve Rauschenberger, former two-term Gov. Jim Edgar, head of the Illinois Bush-Cheney '04 campaign, former Gov. Jim Thompson, who runs a powerhouse law firm, and former Lt. Gov. Corinne Wood.
Some Republicans are talking about drafting the maverick incumbent Fitzgerald to run for a second term.
"Maybe the people of Illinois will wake up and see what he has brought to the table in Washington," conservative state central committeeman Steve Meyer told illinoisleader.com. "He's done an excellent job for a first-term senator."
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