“Inside the Mind of Mark Foley” will begin airing Sept. 22 on WSVU in North Palm Beach.

Foley taped his first show Tuesday. The station says Foley will explore the inner workings of Washington on the show.

Foley resigned his House seat in 2006 after being confronted with salacious e-mails and instant messages he sent to underage congressional pages.

He lives in West Palm Beach, and also works in real estate investment.

Foley represented parts of Palm Beach County for 12 years in Congress and built a national reputation as an advocate for tougher laws against child sexual predators.

Then, a few weeks after Dick starting shooting the film in 2007, Idaho senator Larry Craig got caught tap dancing in a bathroom stall.  Dick had to hustle to keep up with it all.

“The story was put into fast-forward,” says Dick, whose previous films include This Film is Not Yet Rated and the Oscar-nominated Twist of Faith.  “With these scandals, the discussion of the closet sort of was swirling around us as we were making this film.”

The resulting documentary, Outrage, opened in five major cities last weekend and will go wide over the next few months.  So far, Dick’s been very heartened by the public reaction.  “No one has stood up and said, ‘I’m upset that you’re outing people’ which has surprised me,” remarks Dick.  “It seems like people really understand the argument of the film, the importance of reporting on this hypocrisy.”

365gay.com: What inspired you to make Outrage?

KIRBY DICK:  I was in Washington, DC promoting my last film, This Film Is Not Rated and I thought, ‘There must be a lot of great stories here.’  I started asking around and very quickly came upon this subject.  It’s fascinating, the psychology of these people who, in exchange for having a long political career, would live a double life.

A few days after I saw the film, I saw you interviewed on CNN.  The anchor Don Lemon seemed a bit offended that you were naming names, like it was rude or bad form.  I thought, ‘Did he see the same movie I saw?’

That’s what people have said when they watched it.  I actually want to give him more credit.  What I’ve found is it’s not the reporters themselves that don’t want to cover this story.  It’s the people up the ladder that have prevented mainstream reporters from covering this. I’m speculating but I think that’s what you were seeing reflected was the pressure he was receiving or he felt he would receive from higher up, rather than his own personal approach.

In your last documentary This Film Is Not Yet Rated, you exposed the double standard in the way the MPAA rating system deals with gay sex scenes versus straight.  Now, you’ve made Outrage.  Have you always had an awareness and interest in gay issues?

My best friend in high school was gay and we had all these discussions and then he had a group of friends who were also gay.  It really kind of normalized the whole thing for me when I was young and I’m very grateful for that.

In making Outrage, were you ever threatened or afraid for your safety?

We took precautions and we operated very much under the radar.  I have not received any threats.  However, in the process of looking into various politicians around the country, I spoke to a number of sources who seemed quite afraid to talk and in many cases, did not talk at all.  I don’t know if that fear was justifiable but I know the fear was real.

A number of people in your film comment on how gay Washington DC is, in terms of the people who work there and the whole vibe of the place.  Did you pick up on that?

Not initially but as soon as somebody pointed it out, yes.  I think my gaydar was always decent but it has been very refined by working in Washington, DC.

It must be a special kind of nightmare to be gay and work for a boss who legislates against you.

That’s what’s so horrible.  Take George W. Bush as an example.  He’s a person who’s not homophobic.  We’ve talked to gay people who are friends of his and some of his staffers are gay.  He’s totally comfortable but the fact that he would promote an amendment to restrict the rights of portion of the citizenry just to further his own reelection is appalling.

NEXT PAGE: What’s up with Charlie Crist?

Results of a state investigation were to be announced Friday. An FBI investigation hasn’t been closed, but the officials said neither state nor federal charges were expected. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the case.

Foley resigned in 2006 after being confronted with the e-mails and instant messages he sent to pages. He has been under investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the FBI.

Foley’s attorney, David Roth, has acknowledged that Foley sent the messages to the teens, but says the Florida Republican never had inappropriate contact with minors. Roth had no comment on the pending announcement.

In the wake of Foley’s resignation, Roth announced Foley was gay and had been molested by a priest as a teenage altar boy. Foley also checked himself into an Arizona treatment facility for what his attorneys called “alcoholism and other behavioral problems.”

Foley represented parts of Palm Beach County for 12 years. He has kept a low profile since emerging from rehabilitation late last year but occasionally has been seen in the Palm Beach area, where he lives with his boyfriend.

Foley was seen as a shoo-in for re-election in 2006. His resignation received national attention as Democrats were trying to regain power in the House. Democrat Tim Mahoney won the election after Republicans had just weeks to select a new candidate to replace Foley, whose name remained on the ballot.

Then-House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., and other Republican leaders were criticized for their handling of the Foley matter. Hastert claimed he did not learn of Foley’s explicit messages until the scandal broke. However, a House ethics committee concluded in December 2006 that Hastert actually had heard about the messages months earlier, as had other Republicans, but the panel did not find that anyone broke rules.

Florida authorities were hampered in their investigation because neither Foley nor the House would let investigators examine his congressional computers.

In a letter to the FDLE obtained by The Associated Press, House Deputy General Counsel Kerry Kircher wrote that because the data “may contain legislative information that is constitutionally privileged … and because Mr. Foley has not waived that privilege … we cannot simply give you access.”

The state also later reached out to Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seeking help to examine the computers, but were rebuffed again.

The Florida agency had been working with the FBI and Foley’s attorneys to gain access to information on the computers. Foley’s attorneys have declined to comment throughout the investigation.

Foley himself was the only person who could release the computers for review, but he had refused. It was not immediately clear what information from the computers investigators had been able to review – if any – before finishing their investigation.

House officials said they did not find any sexually explicit photos in a review of some e-mails Foley sent and received through his congressional account, but the e-mails did not include all of Foley’s communications.

Some may have been deleted from the main congressional computer server but would likely still have been accessible from an examination of the actual computer hard drives.

Tom Rooney, a lawyer and former Army officer won a tight three-way Republican primary Monday to compete for the seat, long considered a Republican stronghold in Florida.

Foley abruptly resigned Sept. 29, 2006 after the first of the emails was made public.

The Republican congressman e-mailed one former Capitol page five times, but had said there was nothing inappropriate about the exchanges. The page was 16 at the time of the e-mail correspondence.

The initial correspondence took place in August 2005 after the boy gave Foley a handwritten thank you note before returning to Louisiana.

In his exchanges with the boy, Foley asked how old he was, what he wanted for his upcoming birthday, how he was doing after Hurricane Katrina and for a photo.

Other emails were reportedly more suggestive, but Foley denied doing anything wrong.

Despite Foley’s resignation the House Ethics Committee launched an investigation that led to changes in the page program. A probe by the FBI and Florida officials went nowhere.

Foley was considered a moderate Republican.

In 2000 he introduced legislation to expand the federal government’s role in investigating and prosecuting crimes based on sexual orientation, religion, gender or ethnicity.

Foley voted against his party in 2004 and again this year to thwart a federal amendment to the Constitution that would ban same-sex marriage.

Unmarried, questions about Foley’s sexuality had circulated for several years.

In May 2003, he took the unusual step of calling a news conference to denounce a report in a South Florida alternative newspaper that he is gay. Foley refused to answer questions about the subject, saying his sexual orientation had nothing to do with is duties as a lawmaker.

In November 2006 the seat was won by Democrat Tim Mahoney.