It’s time for Michelle Bachmann to stop.
Since she joined Congress in 2006, she has lurched from one ludicrous policy position to another, frequently being vocal about things that most Republicans and Democrats wouldn’t touch. Anywhere there is a conservative conspiracy theory, you’ll find Bachmann front and center. From authoring Constitutional amendments to bar a worldwide currency, to claims ACORN was infiltrating the US census, from claiming an Obama trip to India would cost $200 million a day, to promising to bring the price of gasoline down to $2 if she’s elected President, there’s not been a gimmick or nutty theory she hasn’t stepped up to champion.
For the most part, these issues are relatively harmless. She is one Congresswoman out of 435, and she is neither well liked nor respected in the House Republican Caucus. Despite being one of two members of the House of Representatives who seriously ran for President (Ron Paul being the other) she received a whopping one endorsement from her fellow Representatives. Ron Paul had 3. Being in Congress gives one a bully pulpit to champion causes, no matter how ridiculous, and Bachmann has taken advantage of it. And we could all laugh at the odd State of the Union response, or the bizarreness of mixing up John Wayne and John Wayne Gacy.
But this time, she’s taken it one step too far.
Back in June, Bachmann, along with four other Republican members of Congress, sent letters to the Inspectors General of the State Department, National Intelligence Director, Homeland Security Department, Defense Department and Justice Department urging them to investigate claims that the Muslim Brotherhood, a muslim organization that has not been labeled a terrorist organization by the State Department, had been engaged in “influence operations” within the U.S. Government. The result of these “operations” being Obama Administration leniency towards the Muslim Brotherhood as well as what she described as “[s]erial acts of what can only be interpreted by our Islamist enemies as submission to the supremacist doctrine they call ‘shariah’ and the information, (sic) dominance that is enabling its uncontested insinuation into our civil society institutions, government and country.”
In her version of the letter to the State Department IG she references long-time Hillary Clinton aide (and wife of ex-Rep. Anthony Weiner) Huma Abedin, saying that Abedin has had three family members, including her parents and brother, who have connections with the Muslim Brotherhood, and stating that Abedin has “routine access to the Secretary to policy-making.” She didn’t outright call Abedin a spy, but the implication is clear. She used the Michael Moore tried-and-true method of putting a few claims together and allowing the reader to jump to conclusions without actually having to connect the dots in writing.
It didn’t stop there. After Congressman Keith Ellison, a muslim Congressman and a member of her Minnesota delegation, called Bachmann out on her letters, she responded to him with a 16 page footnoted response, again questioning how Abedin could have a high level security clearance, given her familial “connections” to the Muslim Brotherhood.
These attacks on Abedin seem like just another example of Bachmann’s penchant for conspiracy theories that get her network airtime. Abedin has served as a close aide to Secretary Clinton for nearly 20 years, since she began interning in the White House in 1996. She followed her to the Senate, to her presidential campaign, and then to the State Department, and then married a member of Congress. What’s different about Bachmann’s attack here is that she’s gone beyond just spouting conspiracy theories – now she’s insinuating that a high ranking staffer in the State Department is not just a security risk, but could be engaging in espionage and treason.
Abedin is not a terrorist and she’s not a spy. She’s not linked to terrorists. Even the “evidence” of relationships Bachmann claims exist are thinly documented, as Congressman Ellison noted in his last response to Bachmann. Abedin has been at senior levels of government and had access to Presidents, Senators, Congressmen and other high ranking officials for years. She’s gone through background check after background check, likely with polygraphs, for the inevitable security clearances she had to have in order to serve in those positions. No one has claimed she’s anything other than a loyal aide, although she’s had to weather ridiculous rumors before.
The bottom line is that Bachmann’s claims about Abedin are unsupported by any concrete facts. They are both completely inappropriate and irresponsible from a member of Congress.
But this isn’t just a typical Bachmann move, saying something unsupported by the facts, like her claims about vaccines and autism. Her statements have put Abedin at risk. Already, Abedin has received death threats. Her statements have been criticized by Republicans from John McCain to John Boehner, and the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee – which Bachmann is a member of and loves to name drop – Mike Rogers (R-MI) has said “I have no information in my committee that would indicate that Huma is anything other than an American patriot.”
The worst part, if there can be anything worse than accusing someone of being a spy without evidence, is that this is clearly just a PR stunt. If you believe that a senior member of the State Department is a security risk, you don’t request a counterintelligence operation by sending letters to six different agencies and then put out a press release about it. She doesn’t really care about whether Abedin is a security risk or not – she just wants the attention she can generate by playing the role of the modern McCarthy.
Despite what some of my Bearing Drift colleagues may think, I don’t like criticizing Republicans. I only do it when I feel it is absolutely necessary. This is one of those situations. Bachmann is an embarrassment to our party, and her continued use of her position to tilt at windmills damages the credibility of our brand. I can forgive her if she makes mistakes or misspeaks. But when she insinuates that a long-time staffer to Hillary Clinton is a sleeper agent for the Muslim Brotherhood, she goes far beyond just being an annoying sideshow. She becomes dangerous, and it’s time for all of us to step up and tell her she’s wrong.
She’s wrong. She should be removed from the Intelligence Committee and from the whip team. She has demonstrated that she cannot be trusted with such a position, and will use it to promote her fringe theories. And she should be shunned by the rest of party, even more than she already is. There can be no place for this kind of nonsense in the Congress.
I hope that other Republicans, both in the House and outside of it, make it clear that Bachmann does not represent our views and that her bizarre conspiracy theories do not represent what the Republican party is all about.
It’s time for her to stop.
