Abscam

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A major undercover investigation conducted by the FBI in the early 1980s in which agents posed as Arab businessmen to catch public officials accepting bribes
2. An extensive federal law-enforcement sting operation of the 1980s designed to expose and prosecute corruption among members of Congress and other government officials
3. A celebrated FBI undercover investigation from 1980-1981 in which undercover agents impersonated wealthy Arab investors to entrap corrupt public officials and politicians

Etymology: The FBI's 1980 sting operation that caught several members of Congress taking bribes was code-named Abscam, and the name was first shaped by a simple shortening. The operation's cover was a fictitious Arab sheikh's business, so the name began as a clipped form of "Arab scam." That label drew protests, and the operation was then re-explained as "Abdul scam," after the name of the fictitious company involved. The second version is the one that stuck in the public mind as a sort of folk story: the name was adjusted to something that sounded like a personal name rather than a national or ethnic label. Officials had to backtrack because the original phrasing offended Arab Americans, and the revised version kept the sting's memorable name while changing the implied ethnic slur.