Gawker editor in chief shocked Lee resigned

Remy Stern, the editor in chief of Gawker.com, the website that broke the scandal on Congressman Chris Lee’s Craigslist email exchange, said the story has grown to more than he imagined.

Stern said he was as surprised as anyone to see Lee resign. Once the story was posted to their website, he said, they were looking forward to see what comments Lee would make publicly.

“I think we’re all probably wondering, given how quickly he resigned, if there’s more to the story,” Stern said. “Who knows where they story’s going to go from here.” Stern said, however, that there’s nothing more that Gawker has to release on the topic.

“There were not any more emails that have any consequence,” he said. “There may have been another email or two that was trivial, but there was nothing damning that we held back.” Stern said the story took about a week to come together because the folks at Gawker wanted to be careful, knowing the potential ramifications.

“Looking at the [woman’s] story. Looking at the emails. We were trying to decide if it was legit,” he said. “I think in this case, we really wanted to be sure.” In the end, Stern said, they decided the unnamed woman who had emailed them her tale of an email exchange with a sitting congressman was telling the truth about the story.

Gawker is not known for hard hitting political pieces, the celebrity gossip website other current top stories include topics such as Lindsay Lohan, Justin Bieber and Victoria Beckham.

That’s not to say that Gawker ignores political talk, but it isn’t what their known for. And Stern said political scandal is not exactly their bread-and-butter.

“This is a first for Gawker,” Stern said, of having a congressman resign over a piece written on the website.