Ron Paul Bribery Scandal (Say it isn't so) (Yea Right)
Ron Paul '12 Campaign Accused Of Bribing Iowa State Senator Kent Sorenson
Quoted Text
State Sen. Kent Sorenson was serving as Rep. Michele Bachmann's Iowa campaign chairman in December 2011 when he abruptly quit and gave Paul a surprise endorsement. Bachmann accused Sorenson of accepting money to jump ship within hours of the incident.
The emails include a three-page memo from Aaron Dorr, an Iowa gun rights advocate, to John Tate, Paul’s campaign manager, that says Sorenson would need certain things before he switched allegiances from Michele Bachmann to Paul. Sorenson "needs to match his current salary of $8,000 a month" through fall 2012; Sorenson’s Senate clerk, Chris Dorr "would have to have his salary matched" at $5,000 a month; and Sorenson would need $100,000 to be placed in a political action committee account that would be controlled by Sorenson and the Dorrs.
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. John Kenneth Galbraith
Iowa state Sen. Kent Sorenson received but never cashed a check from a person affiliated with Ron Paul’s presidential campaign, according to an audio tape obtained and posted online by the Iowa Republican website.
The tape records a January, 2012, conversation between Sorenson, R-Milo, and conservative activist Dennis Fusaro. It was recorded just after Sorenson defected from the presidential campaign of U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann and joined the Paul camp, which went on to take third in the caucuses.
On it, Sorenson describes a meeting in which he and his wife met with Dimitri Kesari, Paul’s deputy national campaign manager. In that meeting, he tells Fusaro, Kesari waited until Sorenson had left the table and then presented his wife with a check, apparently as compensation for Sorenson’s work on the campaign.
Sorenson’s wife accepted the check, but in the recorded conversation with Fusaro, Sorenson said he would not cash it, and instead was weighing whether to return it to Kesari or to “hold on to it so I have something over him.”
The check apparently came from a jewelry store that Kesari owns – not the Ron Paul campaign.
The amount of the check, the exact reason it was offered to Sorenson, the context in which the call with Fusaro took place and the ultimate outcome of the incident remain unclear.
Still, the Iowa Republican’s revelation comes amid much controversy over Sorenson’s political work in the months leading up to the caucuses. Whether or not he received payment from the Bachmann campaign has animated investigations from Des Moines to Washington D.C., including within the state Senate.
Sorenson also confirms that Paul’s National Campaign Chairman, Jesse Benton, was aware of Kesari’s actions. After asking Fusaro if he thought the key players inside the upper echelons of the Ron Paul campaign knew of Kesari’s actions, Fusaro stated that he was confident that Benton knew. Sorenson quickly responds by saying, “Oh, I know Jesse knows. I know Jesse knows.”
Fusaro: Well, I’m trying to figure out how to keep living life, too, but I’m hearing that you’re about to fall on a grenade here any second.
Sorenson: I’ve been thinking about it, but, uh, you know. You know, I’m out here, and Aaron [Dorr] is trying to talk me out of it, and I think he’s probably right. I don’t want to hurt my friends, you know what I mean?
Fusaro: Yeah. Well, I think you just need to stop talking and get yourself an attorney and figure out what your position is.
Sorenson: Yeah.
Fusaro: I don’t know how all this, I’m not advising you to do one thing or another other than just do what’s right, but I don’t know exactly what that is.
Sorenson: Yeah.
Fusaro: Are you talking to Guy [Short] again?
[Guy Short is the Bachmann consultant who allegedly improperly paid Sorenson through his political consulting firm, C&M Strategies. Former Bachmann chief-of-staff Andy Parrish swore in an affidavit that Sorenson was being paid by C&M Strategies for his work on the Bachmann presidential campaign.]
Sorenson: No. No, I spoke to him once since this happened, and I told him, I just told him that I was sorry I hurt him, and someday I hope we can have a friendship again. That was it.
Fusaro: Yeah, so…
Sorenson: I don’t trust him.
Fusaro: You don’t trust him? Well, why should you?
Sorenson: Yeah, I know.
Fusaro: I’m just trying to figure out why Demitri Kesari gets off scotfree and gets to do all this crap, and nobody lays a glove on him.
Sorenson: Yeah.
Fusaro: So, I guess you can give him, well I hope, well I don’t know.
Sorenson: I’m going to give him his check back.
Fusaro: Oh, you are?
Sorenson: Do you think I should, or should I hold on to it? I’m not cashing it.
Fusaro: I understand.
Sorenson: Do you think I should hold on to it or do a deal? Should I hold on to it so I have something over him?
Fusaro: I don’t think I’d give it to him, no.
Sorenson: Okay.
Fusaro: Have you, I don’t presume you have been paid by them [the Paul campaign – other than the initial check from Kesari]. Sounds to me like you are not going to be working with them after this. I’m confused. I mean, if you are not doing his bidding, he’s not going to pay you.
Sorenson: No, I agree with you.
Fusaro: I understand that Ron Paul came out and said that nobody gave you… The lying that’s going on is just incredible. It’s one thing to be smart politically and tough, but now you have Ron Paul out there lying.
Sorenson: You think he knows?
Fusaro: No, actually, I think he doesn’t.
Sorenson: You think they purposefully kept it from him?
Fusaro: Oh sure, it’s like Rothfeld said, they have to run their campaign. He has to run his.
[Michael Rothfield is on the Board of Directors of the National Association for Gun Rights and also the sole director of Saber Communications. Opensecrets.org reported that both Rand Paul and Ron Paul’s 2012 presidential campaign are clients. The firm received $7.7 million for Paul’s 2012 campaign.]
Sorenson: Who do you think knows?
Fusaro: All these guys are corrupt. Who do I think knows? Everyone you told. Everyone Dimitri told. And Dimitri.
Sorenson: Do you think the whole Ron Paul, like all of them know? I mean the inside group?
Fusaro: Sure, I’m sure Jesse Benton knows, he’s a scum…
Sorenson: Oh, I know that Jesse knows. I know Jesse knows.
Fusaro: He’s a scumbag. Pause
Fusaro: By the way, just for my edification, is the name of Dimitri’s store, is it Market Station Jewelers?
Sorenson: I honest to God don’t know. I’ll have to look at the check and tell you. I haven’t even seen it.
[The store is actually called Designer Goldsmiths, it is located in the Market Station in Leesburg, VA.]
Fusaro: I don’t know.
Sorenson: My wife, he gave it to my wife. Did I tell you what happened?
Fusaro: No.
Sorenson: I kept saying no, and my wife said we can do this. I went to the bathroom, we were in a restaurant, and he made it out to my wife.
Fusaro: Oh great. So he worked his [sic] wife against you. He went around your authority and worked your wife. And this is the great Christian conservative political activist we are all supposed to kiss his [audio goes blank].
[Pause in audio]
Sorenson: I don’t want anyone to know that, okay, because I don’t get in it with my wife, okay?
Fusaro: My point would be, you better, I don’t know. I think you need to sit down with an attorney and say here is what I’ve done, where am I, what do I do? He’ll probably tell you to SHUT UP.
Sorenson: I have. I’ve learned my lesson.
Fusaro: I mean, that piece by Kevin Hill [Hall] on The Iowa Republican was pretty damaging.
Sorenson: Yeah.
Fusaro: It has nothing to do with the Iowa state ethics laws.
Sorenson: Let me call you right back, I just had someone walk up to me, okay?
Fusaro: Alright, bye.
Sorenson: Bye
[Pause in audio]
Sorenson: I just had a guy yell at me.
Fusaro: He doesn’t like Ron Paul?
Sorenson: This guy was douchebag, said, “Boy, you caused quite a controversy.” I said, “Yeah, it’s quite a sh*t storm, isn’t it?”
Fusaro: Yep. So, I mean, I guess you’re just not going to work for anybody?
Sorenson: You know, Dennis, I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do. And I have got to quit talking to people because every time I talk to somebody, they talk to somebody, and it comes back to bite me in the butt.
Fusaro: Yeah, you’ve got that right.
Sorenson: Aaron’s freaking out because I quit, and I could hurt him and his groups. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I don’t know. I don’t know.
Fusaro: Alright, I’ll leave it alone. Do what you got to do.
Box is dragging out a smear story from December 2011.
The story is from TODAY 08/07/2013 on the Huffington Post.
This is the first that I've read about the Dirty Dealings of Ron Paul buying votes, but I'm not surprised. There is a continuing pattern of scandal and racism that has followed the Paul Twins from their very beginnings in politics. This story is just more of the same.
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. John Kenneth Galbraith
The accusation was made by Bachmann in 2011. HuffPo is recycling the story nearly 2 years later.
Yup this is the scandal that died before it even started, I remember this from back then and it went nowhere
"In the beginning of a change, the Patriot is a scarce man, brave, hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, however, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a Patriot."
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. John Kenneth Galbraith
It appears that the Ron Paul Scandal is now unraveling as the Cover Up fails.
There was no cover up, all of this was already reported on years ago, go check out some Ron Paul forums and see what they thought about Jesse Benton, everyone hated him and wanted him removed because of his shady stunts and crappy handling job of the campaign, better yet YouTube Jesse Benton is see what pops up. Sorry box no new scandal here, maybe one day you will find something worth posting about.
"In the beginning of a change, the Patriot is a scarce man, brave, hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, however, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a Patriot."
Box, Like Jerk Off Box, his pal- are just following orders. Don't be so harsh on them.
"While Foreign Terrorists were plotting to murder and maim using homemade bombs in Boston, Democrap officials in Washington DC, Albany and here were busy watching ME and other law abiding American Citizens who are gun owners and taxpayers, in an effort to blame the nation's lack of security on US so that they could have a political scapegoat."
Now box why don't we focus on something important and true, like the victims of Major Husan who cannot get benefits, the health care they need or medals including purple hearts because Obama's government says Ft. Hood was NOT an act of terror it was a workplace incident. HMMMMMM
(Yea Right)
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