Committee for the Re-Election of the President
The Committee for the Re-election of the President (also known as the Committee to Re-elect the President), abbreviated CRP, but often mocked by the acronym CREEP, was, officially, a fundraising organization of United States President Richard Nixon's 1972 re-election campaign during the Watergate scandal. History. Planning began in late 1970 and an office opened in the spring of 1971. Besides its re-election activities, CRP employed money laundering and slush funds, and was involved in the Watergate scandal. The CRP used $500,000 in funds raised to re -elect President Nixon to pay legal expenses for the five Watergate burglars. This act helped turn the burglary into an explosive political scandal. The burglars, as well as G. Gordon Liddy, E. Howard Hunt, John N. Mitchell, and other Nixon administration figures (Watergate Seven), were indicted over the break-in and their efforts to cover it up. The acronym CREEP was derisively applied to the CRP as a nickname by Nixon's opponents; the pejorative became popular due to the Watergate scandal.