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Charlie Neibergall / AP file
U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., speaks at a rally by home-school advocates in March 2011 at the Statehouse in Des Moines, Iowa.
Eight months after Michele Bachmann's 2012 presidential bid ground to a halt in Iowa, her campaign manager there signed a sworn affidavit, pointing his finger at another top staffer in a still-simmering dispute over the misuse of a contact list of home-school family names.
The Sept. 4 affidavit – first reported by the Iowa Republican and obtained Friday by NBC News – was written by Bachmann's Iowa adviser Eric Woolson, and accuses former State Sen. Kent Sorenson of stealing the list from another Bachmann staffer. Sorenson was the campaign’s state chairman at the time.
"We took it," Woolson says Sorenson told him.
The list was the at the center of a flap late in Bachmann's presidential run, when a powerful Iowa home-school network called “NICHE” complained that its collection of contacts for thousands of home-school families had been mined by the campaign and used to expand its fundraising.
At the time, the campaign called the emails a "mistake." The campaign agreed to pay NICHE, a 501c3 nonprofit, several thousand dollars in order to keep the group compliant with federal elections law.
But in his affidavit, Woolson says he approached Sorenson on the same day the fundraising emails were sent, and was told the list had been stolen.
"Kent smiled at me and said, 'Do you want to know how it happened?'" Woolson writes, adding:
I said, "No," and tried to back out of his office.
Kent said, "We took it." Kent said they weren't getting anything from Barb (Heki), so when she stepped out of the office they took it.
Kent said, "We stood watch."
Woolson appears to corroborate the account of the alleged victim, Barb Heki, who last summer filed a lawsuit against Bachmann and other high-ranking staff, including Sorenson and Woolson.
Heki, who was the campaign's Homeschool Coalitions Director and a NICHE member, says she was unjustly blamed for leaking the list and that she and her husband later lost their seats on the group's board. Heki alleged senior staff was aware of what Sorenson had done but allowed her reputation to suffer.
Sorenson has long denied taking the list, saying he helped negotiate the solution with NICHE.
"Nothing new here," he said over text message Friday. "Same story being recycled."
Sorenson later bolted Bachmann's campaign for the Ron Paul team – a high-profile defection that helped cripple her campaign days before the caucuses.
Lawyers for the Bachmann campaign have also disputed Heki's claims.
A court filing this summer called the case a “broad brush, shotgun approach” that “fails to inform Michele Bachmann… and the other named defendants (other than perhaps Kent Sorenson) what they did wrong.”
A Polk County Judge on Jan. 30 denied the defendants' motion to dismiss the suit.
In his affidavit, Woolson says Heki ultimately learned details of the alleged theft from Bachmann herself, during a staff party the day after Bachmann quit the presidential race.
"Barb approached me and said Michele Bachmann told her Kent Sorenson had taken the NICHE list and asked me if it was true," Woolson says. "I nodded yes."
Bachmann's campaign lawyer and congressional office did not immediately respond to a request for a comment.
Woolson's name was dropped from Heki's lawsuit sometime after he signed the affidavit. He declined to comment for this story.
Bachmann dropped out of the presidential race one day after finishing last among the candidates competing in the Jan. 3, 2012, caucuses.
Follow Jamie Novogrod on Twitter at @JamieNBCNews.
Leave a Comment:
You libs are by no means a majority you won the election by three points grantrd you won we had a sorry turn out this is a divided country so quit peeing on your self Obama is the weekest piece of @!$%# that ever occupied the white house and an embarresment to the U S A
six points obama won....doc and if he was white it would have been 65 35
Doc
Take your meds ,,,your party lost bad again.They will lose the house and will not be elected to the whitehouse for along time
Three points Bullet we havent had a landslide since Reagan. How old are you any way.
5 million people and by next election another 4% whittie will die..so i'm thinking hillary by 10%
Doc tard
Bush was the biggest pos you morons hired,,where was low iq punk red neck durring the election,,oh that's right they told him to stay hidden.
Looooooosers
Four more years hahanhehehoho,,dam you,right tards blow
Judging by the quality of your language you and most of the leftlosers use in these forums and the IQ of a toaster you guys display, there is no better president for you and the president couldn`t have better followers. Basicaly, you are so stupid you can only use insults and put downs because an inteligent conversation will give you migranes.
So sweet watching Bachmann being destroyed in the primaries, then fade back into obscurity only to now be dogged by her illegal campaign practices. Don't get much better than this. She may have to run away to Switzerland after all. Having said all that, I'd totally do her though - she's sexy in weird way.
Hry, TMO... It must be that looney, cross-eyed look and dip-sh!t smile of Bachmann's. That broad acts like you don't have to spend much money on drinks or weed to get her to act "high" and dragged to the sack.
Now, the people that vote for this looney b!tch is another thing...!! My, my, my!
I wouldn't expect anything more from a Dirt Bag like Michelle Bachman. This woman has the morals of an Alley Cat.
Typical Democrips Bulletdouch devert talk about something beside the current problem starying you in the face . I don't think your boy is gonna make four more years.
A republican publication broke this story. I you had bothered to read instead of crying about it, you would have known that. They hid it in the first sentence of the second paragraph.
Not crying just saying look how the left takes of with it and will not cover real issues just saying
Michael, excellent point. However, you understand that most of the GOP and Tea Party dopes never bother to read. They get ALL their information from Rush, Laura Ingraham, Michael Savage and the like. Remember, these people think Education is for Snobs.
Wrong chuckie apparently you do not have depth and understanding for you have missed point all together. And if you recieve your education from MSNBC, Then I understand and you are forgiven.
funny conservatives always say that if you get your education from msnbc..... because if i said you watched fox news i wouldn't include the term you received your education......because it aint about no learnin boy...heheh
doc, if you made a point worth noting it was lost on all of us. To quote Bobby Jindal, a rising star in the GOP, we need to stop being the "Stupid Party" I wonder why he said that?? Maybe, just maybe a lot of people in your party have said stupid things. You are a perfect example.
By the way bullet you are one of those folks that could not pass the mental part of a gun back ground check which I am totally in favor of.
Doc tard
I served under regan,second old enough,third,Obama will last. Boy
Served what?
Quit drinking Bulldouch can't understand you . OUT
Now you really should go get Some healthcare,before you get fined,,,lmao
I had prided myself for never having voted for the democratic or republican Presidential candidate until the likes of Michelle Bachmann showed up on the national political scene. Bachmann, Palin, Eric Cantor, and the like forced me to vote for a democrat for President for the first time in my life in 2008 - Barack Obama.
After watching 4years of obstuction by these hypocritical traitors that put party before country, I happily voted for the President and was even tempted to put an Obama yard sign in my lawn this past November.
If you have ever heard of the Know-Nothing party and the Dixiecrats, they have something very much in common with the Tea-Party....All hate groups. The Tea-Party will join the other two in the scrap heap of political oblivion, and Michelle Bachmann will be nothing but a forgotten footnote.
Tea-Party mantra: " We are old, delusional, and dying. We are driven by hate and praying for America to implode, so we can curse Barack Hussein Obama with our last dying breath screaming 'L I B E R A L' at Jesus as he welcomes us into heaven." If I were the GOP, I would distance myself from this mess. The problem for the GOP is that they embraced it. Good Luck with that!
I have 132 guns
Do you have any bullets?
couldn't you have just gotten a dog you'ld be happier
Bulldouch come on now your lying I can tell lmao ! how much you been drinkin ?
Do you know what the sacriest thing is about the Republicans ? They Inbreed. They have to because no one else can stand them.
Really? Why don't you try saying something intelligent?
I did say something intelligent once. It damn near ruined my reputation.
True,,like doc. Lmao
her husband still getting paid by the goverment to cure the gay...in people..?
Look at the populas of the red sates,fat ugly uneducated,dumb,,,
and donor states meaning including texas they receive more than they pay in to the federal goverment...is that what mitt was talking about those red state 47% takers
Hey, you're talking about me and I live in Idaho. Oh. Red states - Idaho, yea, I see what you mean.
yes give us the money back.... we can use it for sandy relief since you republican waited two months to authorize....
And the fattest, least educated and dumb of the red states tend to the democrats.
Put you must be joking... Red states, not even partially purple states, have the highest obesity rates per capita in the WORLD!
I'm your worst nightmare doc
how does karl rove keep his job he was a one hit wonder with bush...
Indie
Great post
hey doc is that a yellow amc pacer in the picture..
No its a 70 boss 302 fast back mustang
Great car, doc1255!
I owned a 1970 Mustang Mach1 for 16 years. It was a gorgeous yellow, too-- 351W, with 4-spd Hurst shifter, power front disc brakes, driving lamps, A/C, PS, chrome hood latches, nice stereo, hood signals, frt & rear spoilers, Crager-type chrome mags, auto seatlifts, foldown rear seatback, full guages, rim horn, factory headers w/dual exhaust.
Keep that Boss hoss. "Mustangs are king." :)
Rove is already irrelavent
Rove is irrelavent, but I am cheering for him. He has taken up the task of breaking up the Republican Party. I certainly applaud him for that. Go Karl.
Hey, Reb-
you lost.
And lost bad
No matter what the exact circumstances are in these types of 'scandals', besides the campaign advisers and those who actually carried out the deed, the damn candidate needs to be held responsible.
Remember Harry Truman, "the buck stops here".
Fines and jail time for all involved, including M. Bachmann.