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The United States Presidency of Richard Nixon, also known as the Nixon Administration, was the executive branch of the federal government of the United States from January 20, 1969 to August 9, 1974. To date, Nixon is the only president to resign the office. The term Watergate has come to encompass an array of clandestine and often illegal activities undertaken by members of the Nixon administration. Those activities included "dirty tricks" such as bugging the offices of political opponents and people of whom Nixon or his officials were suspicious. Nixon and his close aides ordered harassment of activist groups and political figures, using the FBI, CIA, and the Internal Revenue Service. The activities became known after five men were caught breaking into Democratic party headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C. on June 17, 1972. The Washington Post picked up on the story; reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward relied on an informant known as "Deep Throat"—later revealed to be Mark Felt, associate director at the FBI—to link the men to the Nixon administration. Nixon downplayed the scandal as mere politics, calling news articles biased and misleading. As a series of revelations made it clear that Nixon aides had committed crimes in attempts to sabotage the Democrats and others, senior aides such as White House Counsel John Dean and Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman faced prosecution.[12][104][105] In July 1973, White House aide Alexander Butterfield testified that Nixon had a secret taping system that recorded his conversations and phone calls in the Oval Office. These tapes were subpoenaed by Watergate Special Counsel Archibald Cox. Nixon refused to release them, citing executive privilege. With the White House and Cox at loggerheads, Nixon had Cox fired in October in the "Saturday Night Massacre"; he was replaced by Leon Jaworski. In November, Nixon's lawyers revealed that an audio tape of conversations, held in the White House on June 20, 1972, featured an 18½ minute gap.[105] Rose Mary Woods, the President's personal secretary, claimed responsibility for the gap, alleging that she had accidentally wiped the section while transcribing the tape, though her tale was widely mocked. The gap, while not conclusive proof of wrongdoing by the President, cast doubt on Nixon's statement that he had been unaware of the cover-up.[106] Though Nixon lost much popular support, even from his own party, he rejected accusations of wrongdoing and vowed to stay in office.[105] He insisted that he had made mistakes, but had no prior knowledge of the burglary, did not break any laws, and did not learn of the cover-up until early 1973.[107] On October 10, 1973, Vice President Agnew resigned amid allegations—unrelated to Watergate—of bribery, tax evasion and money laundering from his tenure as Maryland's governor. Nixon chose Gerald Ford, Minority Leader of the House of Representatives, to replace Agnew.[108] On November 17, 1973, during a televised question and answer session with the press,[109] Nixon said, People have got to know whether or not their President is a crook. Well, I'm not a crook. I've earned everything I've got.[110] The legal battle over the tapes continued through early 1974, and in April 1974 Nixon announced the release of 1,200 pages of transcripts of White House conversations between him and his aides. The House Judiciary Committee, opened impeachment hearings against the President on May 9, 1974, which were televised on the major networks. These hearings culminated in votes for articles of impeachment, the first being 27--11 in favor on July 27, 1974 on obstruction of justice.[107] On July 24, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the full tapes, not just selected transcripts must be released.[111] Even with support diminished by the continuing series of revelations, Nixon hoped to win through. However, one of the new tapes, recorded soon after the break-in, demonstrated that Nixon had been ...