The Reagan Library has two parts-- the Reagan Foundation that is pretty much the political arm, and the Reagan Library branch of the National Archives.
When I initially started researching this story, I contacted the Reagan Foundation and asked if it was accurate that no one had touched President Reagan's bible since his passing in 2004. They said that was not accurate, that the Bible has been moved (and touched) several times since President Reagan's death.
I then contacted the National Archives and asked, specifically, if Nancy Reagan or Scott Walker made the request to handle the Reagan Bible and if they could verify the Foundation's assertion that others have touched the Bible since Reagan's death.
The National Archives' curator for the Reagan Bible, Jennifer Torres, emailed a statement to me (and cc'd the Reagan Library's other National Archive curators) that confirmed that others have touched the Bible since Reagan's passing. She also said that Walker, not Nancy Reagan requested to have Walker handle the Bible. I followed-up and asked if Walker is the only visiting dignitary to make such a request and she said that she believed that was correct.
With that information in hand, I again watched Walker's video where he tells a group of Milwaukee County Republicans that Nancy Reagan requested that he hold the Bible for the first time since her husband passed a way. Clearly Walker was trying to convey to the audience that Nancy Reagan was making a special gesture toward him.
With that information, I wrote the story in The Progressive and cross-posted a summary of it here at Daily Kos. The next day, the Associated Press's Scott Bauer ran with the story and contacted the Walker campaign. They did not contest the story.
Then today, the Reagan Foundation (the political arm of the Library) came out swinging for Walker... but they're doing a really lousy job.
They insist that it was all a "simple misunderstanding" and that Walker's story is actually true.
However, they're not willing to confirm that Nancy Reagan made the request and they still confirm that many have touched the Bible since President Reagan's passing.
They are willing to say, however, that Walker didn't personally make the request. That it was actually someone at Reagan Foundation or someone from Walker's advance team that made the request to take the Bible out of its glass case and show it to Walker.
And, even though The Foundation confirms that they show all visiting dignitaries the Reagan bible, they can't explain why they decided, for no apparent reason, to go to the trouble of having a gloved archivist get the Bible out so that Scott Walker could flip through it.
Walker's story of going to see Nancy, her being so impressed with him that she arranged for him to be the first to hold the Reagan Bible since her husband past away is still not true.