HARRISBURG — Bill DeWeese has mountain climbed and bicycled through 64 countries, lards his speech with a grandiloquent vocabulary and cuts a larger-than-life, if somewhat rakish, figure as leader of the House Democrats.

Less than a year after he was a key player in a remarkable bit of political jujitsu that installed affable Republican Dennis O'Brien as speaker of the Democratic-controlled House, DeWeese is fighting for his political life.

Last week, the lifelong resident of Waynesburg, who has represented the state's rural southwesternmost corner since 1976, forced out seven caucus staffers, including his own chief of staff.

He has chosen his words carefully, clearly the result of legal advice as a state grand jury investigates whether state money or workers were illegally used for electioneering.

"I think a lot of us are concerned," said a stalwart supporter within the caucus, Rep. Tom Petrone, D-Allegheny. "We're hoping against hope that he was not the man that gave the orders."

A political survivor and a man of Whitmanesque contradictions, DeWeese is by turns charming and profane, a partisan alley scrapper and enthusiastic back room deal cutter.

His fingerprints are all over the 2001 pension grab and the 2005 pay raise bill, but they can also be found on the expansion of prescription benefits for the elderly and the 2004 slots law, the passage of which he considers a seminal career moment.

"The effort to reduce property taxes in the state was launched that night," he said. "Although it is an excruciating process, I'm going to take great pride in the fact that I was there at the commencement."

He claims life memberships in both the NAACP and National Rifle Association and was an active supporter of the Pittsburgh ballet. And, in the words of his former press secretary Tim Potts, he "is master of the four-letter word."

DeWeese, 57, is divorced, a sensitive topic because of an over-the-top letter he sent to a lobbyist who hired his ex-wife. The letter is available to anyone who Googles "abject, ignoble, mendacious knave."

He clearly revels in the limelight and maneuvers through the often testy floor debates with noticeable magnanimity. But he also punished pay raise dissenters with committee demotions and continues to pursue a defamation lawsuit against a hometown newspaper's reporting of his unwillingness to disclose details of a taxpayer-funded account under his control.

The Wake Forest University history major and former Marine first lieutenant has maintained a self-improvement system that he calls his "phony baloney masters degree" program. It has included yearlong immersion study of such topics as French Impressionist painting, the history of Christianity, the American labor movement and both world wars.

As his three-year tour in the Marines wound down, DeWeese began to pursue a career in federal law enforcement before learning that his local state representative had what proved to be a fatal illness.

DeWeese jumped at the opening, rising to become the House's top ranking Democrat in 1993. That year he outflanked Philadelphian Bob O'Donnell to take over the speakership, a post he held for two years before reverting to minority leader when Republicans retook the chamber.

For many years DeWeese's second-in-command was Rep. Mike Veon, D-Beaver, but the anti-incumbent backlash that almost swept DeWeese out of office in 2006 took out Veon along with a couple dozen others.

DeWeese suddenly found himself in the majority again, but without the unanimous caucus support it would take to return as speaker. He struck a deal to install O'Brien instead, but almost immediately news of the bonuses broke and Attorney General Tom Corbett launched an investigation.

The Philadelphia Inquirer last week editorialized for his removal, but by the end of the week DeWeese was saying the worst seemed to have passed and sounding like a man confident about his future.

"I believe that my behavior has been appropriate and my cooperation with the attorney general's office has been unrelenting," he said.

On Friday, Gov. Ed Rendell said he was concerned that the bonus investigation will lead the Legislature to lose focus on the business before it.