Rep. Michele Bachmann's former chief of staff will tell an Iowa Senate ethics panel that the congresswoman made improper payments to the state chairman of her presidential campaign, the Minneapolis Star Tribune's Kevin Diaz reports ... SNIP ...
The investigation in Iowa is one of at least three ongoing investigations into the congresswoman's presidential campaign. There is also a Federal Election Commission probe and one from the Office of Congressional Ethics. Authorities also reportedly opened a criminal investigation into the alleged theft of a email list by Sorenson from a campaign volunteer. As Diaz notes, the investigations are part of a growing web of legal problems facing Bachmann.
Salon
When your former chief of staff provides an affidavit that you made improper payments it is a little hard to claim that there's no fire beneath all that smoke.
More below the Orange Squiggle of Power.
From the Minnesota Star Trib:
Gilmore said Parrish can provide the ethics panel documentary evidence that Sorenson was paid $7,500 a month to work on Bachmann's campaign, money that was funneled to him indirectly through C&M Strategies, a Colorado-based company controlled by Bachmann fundraiser Guy Short.
Parrish is the former CoS. Gilmore is his lawyer. The money came from Bachmann's independent PAC, which makes it almost impossible for her to claim innocence - not that reality and logic have much to do with her speech.
Parrish's willingness to go public against his former employer and political mentor is likely to send shock waves through Minnesota GOP circles, where both he and his attorney are well-known figures.
Parrish served as deputy campaign manager of last year's unsuccessful effort to pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting same-sex marriage. Gilmore is a well-known conservative blogger.
The Minnesota GOP has some problems, oh yes they do. And that's what happens when one of the leading figures in the state party is a lunatic grifter ... come to think of it, that really doesn't narrow it down to Minnesota.
Michele has other problems than making illegal payments to Mr. Sorenson. Sorenson allegedly stole a proprietary mailing list from a volunteer's computer, and the police are investigating that. Congressional investigators are looking into her conflating her book tour and her Presidential campaign - good thing Newt Gingrich is no longer in Congress.
It will be a sad day for Kossacks when Michele Bachmann retires from Congress. Who will take her place as the March to Madness champion of the GOP? Only time will tell! There are certainly no shortage of candidates in the party for which facts are optional.
And somehow, this reminds me of Ms. Bachmann's modus operandi.
Dr. Who has fought many strange foes, but none stranger than the Minnesota Loon