Tarryl Clark Goes After MIchele Bachmann's "Truthiness"

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Carrie Lucking,
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
St. Cloud, MN
THE BACHMANN AGENDA: TRUTHINESS FAIL
It's time to hold Congresswoman Bachmann to a reasonable standard of honesty

Congresswoman Michele Bachmann received a special distinction yesterday, but not the kind that the voters of the 6th District might expect: PolitiFact, a non-partisan fact-checking organization, announced that Bachmann "continues to hold the rare distinction of an all False/Pants-on-Fire record."

Bachmann has been put to their truth test eleven times, and eleven times she has failed, due to comments that PolitiFact said are "sensationalized" and are "misrepresentation taken to a ridiculous extreme."

This isn't the first time Bachmann has failed the truthiness test. Congresswoman Bachmann's radio and television ads in the 6th District Congressional race are no more honest than her "pants-on-fire" statements that failed the Politifact tests.

• Bachmann ran radio ads in August railing against a state aid package which kept teachers on the job and police officers on the streets in her district. Her claims were "not true" according to MPR's PoliGraph.

• The sales tax claims made in Bachmann's second TV ad, "State Fair," which was plagued by legal challenges for trademark violation, received a D+ from KSTP's Truth Test and was called a "distortion" by WCCO's Reality Check. The claims were also deemed "wrong" by MPR's PoliGraph.

• The false claims in Bachmann's third ad, "Back to School," were based on the same vote - a vote that put the Clean Water, Land and Legacy Amendment on the ballot in 2008. This is particularly egregious because Bachmann herself supported the Legacy Amendment, as reported by the Star Tribune in 2008 and recently confirmed by respected outdoors advocate Ron Schara. Her campaign did not dispute the 2008 story at the time. However, Bachmann's spokesperson, Sergio Gor, now claims that she "never" supported the amendment, which received over 30,000 more votes in the 6th District than Michele Bachmann in 2008 and was enthusiastically supported by hunting and fishing groups.

• Bachmann's latest ads focus primarily on people that the Congresswoman is not running against, and continue to distort Tarryl's positions on the issues.

"It's time for Michele Bachmann to start speaking honestly to the people she was elected to represent," said Zach Rodvold, Tarryl Clark's Campaign Manager. "Voters deserve an honest debate on the issues, not misleading claims or outright lies. Bachmann has spent well over a million dollars spreading misinformation over the radio and on TV in order to hide the fact that she's done nothing for her constituents in four years in Congress. The people of the 6th District deserve better, and we call on Michele Bachmann to begin holding herself to a higher standard of honesty."

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