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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.
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Here's Michele Bachmann on a good day;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUkE9qaVgmo
Is that google-eyed, Minnesota skank-- still on the Senate's Intelligence Committee?
We are doomed..! Or, damned.
Whoever hypnotized that skank did an awesome job. And, that ain't a good thing, either.
She is one bat $hit crazy broad, who never met a government handout she didn't like, unless it helps the
little people, then she has a problem with it! And her husband could play a role on modern family!
I see many commenting on the loss of their guns which makes me wonder because I still have mine. Michelle is above the law and why doesn't Fox news mention much of this?
Democrats in Iowa see Kent Sorenson more of a untrustworthy flake and more at fault then Bachmann.
Kent Sorenson: Sleazier than you thought?
www.bleedingheartland.com/diary/5985/kent-sorenson-sleazier-than-you-thought
Why somebody wants to protest a sleaze bucket is beyond me. I like Iowa Democrats, they are honest.
Top Ten Crazy Bachmann Comments
(1) BACHMANN WARNED ‘THE LION KING’ WAS GAY PROPAGANDA: At the November 2004 EdWatch National Education Conference, Bachmann said the “normalization” of homosexuality would lead to “desensitization”: “Very effective way to do this with a bunch of second graders, is take a picture of ‘The Lion King’ for instance, and a teacher might say, ‘Do you know that the music for this movie was written by a gay man?’ The message is: I’m better at what I do, because I’m gay.”
(2) BACHMANN CLAIMED ABOLISHING THE MINIMUM WAGE WOULD CREATE JOBS: While testifying in front of the Minnesota Senate in 2005, Bachmann said, “Literally, if we took away the minimum wage — if conceivably it was gone — we could potentially virtually wipe out unemployment completely because we would be able to offer jobs at whatever level.” This isn’t remotely true. Even simply reducing the minimum wage would, as Paul Krugman noted, “at best do nothing for employment; more likely it would actually be contractionary.”
(3) BACHMANN CLAIMED THAT SCIENTISTS ARE SUPPORTERS OF INTELLIGENT DESIGN: During a 2006 debate, Bachmann said, “There are hundreds and hundreds of scientists, many of them holding Nobel Prizes, who believe in intelligent design.” This was, and is, not true.
(4) BACHMANN CLAIMED TERRI SCHIAVO WAS ‘HEALTHY’: Not long after Terri Schiavo died, Bachmann said she would have voted for the Palm Sunday Compromise because Schiavo “was healthy. She had brain damage — there was brain damage, there was no question. But from a health point of view, she was not terminally ill.” An autopsy found that Schiavo had suffered irreversible brain damage and her brain, said the medical examiner, was “profoundly atrophied.”
(5) BACHMANN LIKENED VISITING IRAQ TO VISITING MALL OF AMERICA: In 2007, Bachmann returned from a junket to Iraq and told her colleagues, “[T]here’s a commonality with the Mall of America, in that it’s on that proportion. There’s marble everywhere. The other thing I remarked about was there is water everywhere.” As ThinkProgress documented at the time, the comparison was preposterous.
(6) BACHMANN CLAIMED THAT CARBON DIOXIDE IS ‘HARMLESS’: In 2008, a Stanford scientist revealed “direct links” between increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and “increases in human mortality” — globally, he found that as many as “20,000 air-pollution-related deaths per year per degree Celsius may be due to this greenhouse gas.” The next year, Bachmann, who is not a scientist, said that “carbon dioxide is portrayed as harmful. But there isn’t even one study that can be produced that shows that carbon dioxide is a harmful gas.”
(7) BACHMANN CALLED FOR A CONGRESSIONAL WITCH HUNT: Pivoting off the news of Barack Obama’s alleged relationship to former Weather Underground member William Ayers, and his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Bachmann accused the candidate of having “anti-American views.” She then suggested that Congressional liberals — including Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid — ought to be subject to “an exposé” by the media because of their views. “I think people would love to see like that,” she told a stunned Chris Matthews.
(8) BACHMANN SUGGESTED GAY SINGER SHOULD REPENT AFTER GETTING CANCER: Bachmann saw Melissa Etheridge’s cancer as a teachable moment: “Unfortunately she is now suffering from breast cancer, so keep her in your prayers,” she said in November 2004. “This may be an opportunity for her now to be open to some spiritual things, now that she is suffering with that physical disease. She is a lesbian.”
(9) BACHMANN BOASTED ABOUT BREAKING THE LAW: In advance of the 2010 national Census, Bachmann told The Washington Times that she would break the law by not completing the forms. “I know for my family, the only question we will be answering is how many people are in our home,” she said. “We won’t be answering any information beyond that, because the Constitution doesn’t require any information beyond that.” Her "reasoning" is that the Census will be used to set up the FEMA concentration camps everyone knows are coming in 2011. All of this despite the fact that a Census is specifically called for in the sacred text...err, the other sacred text.
(10) BACHMANN CLAIMED THAT GLENN BECK COULD SOLVE THE DEBT CRISIS: During a February trip to South Carolina, Bachmann told a South Carolina audience, “I think if we give Glenn Beck the numbers, he can solve this [the national debt].”
You realize carbon dioxide is what we breathe out right? It's what plants use as food? Historically we are at low levels, having been four times higher than our current rate at one point in history. You can measure it in fossils.
You realize many commercial growers use carbon dioxide pumps, that makes extra carbon dioxide, and injects it into greenhouses to get a greater yield?
Take in a deep breath and exhale .....you just poisened the atmosphere. LOL
Hey big ATC
please don't venture into science, its not your strength, obviously. We can't measure CO2 by "fossils", totally wrong. We can measure it by the amount that is trapped in fossil ice cores, is that what you meant?
CO2 is what plants utilize, but there is much more of it than they need. CO2 levels are higher now than they have been since we have been on this earth. It has risen from 290 to over 380 ppb in just 140 years, thats over a 30% increase in a handful of generations, linked to the industrial revolution. There is a direct link between CO2 levels and global warning, that is not conjecture, that is fact, CO2 traps IR energy that otherwise would radiate back into space. CO2 allows Ultraviolet electromagnetic energy to enter our atmosphere, but doesn't allow the converted infrared electromagnetic energy to leave. IR energy is heat, by the way.
Are you a global warming denyer? I didn't know there were really any more of those. 99.999% of all climatologists (real scientists, not like you) agree in global warming, what possible motive would they have other than it is the truth? A vast conspiracy? Wow, take a deep breath and exhale, smell the horse manure?
What astounds me is that she got re-elected. Who was her competition and how much of a whack job does one have to be to lose to Bachman? Anyone remember when our best and brightest got elected?
Are we really in this bad of a news cycle to be writing stories about a mailing list? That happened a year ago.
Maybe a story on the lady that voted at the ballot place and absentee in Hamilton, OH. And absentee for her granddaughter who happened to vote at the polls also. And three people that voted absentee that had her same residence. And handwriting was all "similar".
Big ATC:
oh god, you again? So, by your logic (or lack thereof), since it happened over a year ago, it doesn't matter that Bachman might well have broken the law? I'm not sure, but I think that the statute of limitations for campaign fraud is over a year, but I could be wrong. Besides, I think anything we can do to get that crazy, unbelievably stupid (even for a repub) woman out of office would be a major benefit for this country.
This is for the 98% of you living in America today. Let's be very clear about this. No one in the government really believes in the United States Constitution. So get over it. People within America's Government believe that the everyday needs of the people who need help are just asking for a handout. Like the old, the sick and children. You can't put food on the table for your family. We the people are only words on paper! There is no America dream for the 98% Americans, so get over it! Today it's we the Rich, We the GOP. You no longer have the right to vote, so get over it! You no longer have the freedom to love who ever you Love. So get over it! You no longer have the rights of freedom. So get over! You don't have no right to live your life as you like, so get over it! You do have the right to have and use a military guns and rifles so you can have fun killing children in school or in the movies or on the street. What ever! Get over it! Women you have no rights at all. If you get raped, that's OK! Don't you know that a women's body was made to have babies. So get over it! We know that rape is the act of the Devil and not an act of God! So get over it! We would think that you would know by now, that a man has the rights to do what we like to you from the time you're born. So get over it. We the people, what a joke! Soon we will take young American children right for schooling. Just think of the tax dollars that could be saved if all children were home-schooled. So what you're 8 year old is home alone to home-schooled. You don't really have to go to work. The GOP is in control of Congress. The GOP is in control. So get over it. We will keep doing what ever we like to you! So get over it! We will keep lying into your face. We really don't care what you think. Get over it people! The United States Constitution is no long, so get over it! You don't know the Constitution. Even you do know all the words, you still don't really understand it what it's all about or your rights. You may say you do, but those just shows us how dumb all you people really are as dumb as they come. Knock, knock, who's their? 98%, the 98% who? The 98% of you have an IQ of 98. We know you're dumb! You put a black man in the oval office! Thinking he has the right to make a change. You don't know that it's congress job to make laws. Their congresses that can only make things happen. That it is congress that is in control of what gets done and what not gets done. But you voted for a black man in the oval office, but you voted for the GOP white men in congress. That is how we the GOP, knows how dumb you all are. We also know that you will not be coming out to vote us out of office in 2014. Thank for not knowing what is going on. Thank you for not knowing the system of the government. Thank you for being dumb. Thank you for not caring to know your rights of the Constitution of the United States of America.
Americans Are DUMB! you don't really know your rights!
Let me tell you, these liberals using list of names obtained illegally to get contributions is just too much corruption and sleaze.
Bachmann IS a liberal, isn't she?
she probably had the wrong people around her ,that did not know how to run a important campaign . Michelle Bachmman for US senate.
Bachmann is almost as much of a has been as Palin. She just about lost in the last election. She's accomplished nothing as a Representative. Her claim to fame this secession was introducing a bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act (for the 37th time) and she didn't get even get a single co-sponsor. She is so crazy that even the run of the mill crazies among the rest of the Republicans in the House want nothing to do with her.
I agree with your opinion of "Ms. Hypnotized", Charlie.
But... ya gotta think of the comedy relief this brainless heifer and representative of the 'baggernut party gives America and Saturday Nite Live. Bachmann's comedic value is still stratospheric, ya know?
And... she's still on the Senate's Intelligence Committee. OUCH...!!
Did she win again Charlie? LOL
"Did she win again Charlie?"
Yep -- she won last time by a very small margin in spite of the fact she had tons of money and her opponent didn't have much. But since she won by such a small margin, she now has a target on her back the next time around, the DNC knows she can be beaten and the money will come flowing in -- for her opponent. Again -- she is so crazy that even the run of the mill crazies among the rest of the Republicans in the House want nothing to do with her.
It is just so much fun to watch the irrelevant far right wing squirm and twist in the wind from their abject delusional thinking and incompetence.
Hey Jerry-562327 Bush was asleep at the wheel and in Texas for the entire month of August 2001. Then the worst attack on U.S. soil happens. 3000 Americans killed and we rally behind Bush and focus our might on the enemy. So Bush had his 9-11, and your flimsy argument that he would be "impeached" over the Benghazi incident is ludicrous. But then Rove and the criminal Cheney with the help of FIXED NEWS kept selling us the B.S. that Bush "kept us safe". NO, IT WAS CLINTON who kept us safe after the '93 truck bomb at the WTC and it was Cheney and Rumsfeld and the rest of their Neo-Con chums that tossed out all of the Al-Qaeda intelligence and instead, re-ignited the Cold War with the Russians, screaming about missile defense and tearing up the START II Treaty. Rumsfeld and Condie were even threatening our allies with isolationism if they didn't allow us to put missile defense in their backyards. Do your homework and read the facts instead of getting brainwashed by the losers at FIXED NEWS, which incidentally, is owned an Aussie, who is married to a Chinese Commie Nationalist, Wendy Deng, and whose biggest share holder is is Arab Prince Alwaleed. But they have the balls to call it "America's News Room"!! They are out to destroy the American Empire and you and the rest of the brainwashed sheep are helping them do it! Think about it. Hannity and is ilk are constantly bashing OUR government, not THEIRS!! TRAITORS!
The most profitable endeavour for a mid level, under achieving, elected official to undertake is to run in the presidential primary with no hope of continuing on as the candidate.
Libbies are "destroying" the country all on their own.
People can rail all they want.
Liberals have been stealing cash from the whole collective of tax payers for years.
Maxine with her sweetheart contracts for her hubbie.
Rangel with his taxpayer expensed trips (while not paying his taxes)
Jesse Jackson Jr. with his campaign finance violations
So, M.C... use your collective, "Stupid Party" logic, and give us all an exact total of what they "stole"? Cite reputable sources, facts, true proofs, and $ figures, please.
Or, forever close your ignorant, manure-filled pie-hole, M.C.
Typical behavior for what the Party of Stupid has become and the American voters know it.
Kick the teabags A$$ out of politics!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
How can you sit on the US Intelligence Committee when you are just the opposite of the committee's name?
I knew it.... you crooked bitch!