A recording posted online suggests a state senator who switched from Michele Bachmann’s campaign to Ron Paul’s just before the 2012 Iowa caucuses received a check from a supporter of Paul.
The founder of www.TheIowaRepublican.com got the audio from a conservative activist who talked with State Senator Kent Sorenson about the check, which was handed to Sorenson’s wife at a restaurant after her husband left the table.
“I’m not cashing it,” Sorenson says on the recording.
Sorenson goes on to say he might “hold on to” the check and use it as leverage in political battles with others in the Ron Paul camp. During the conversation, Sorenson admits to being “freaked out.”
“I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do,” Sorenson says on the recording. “And I’ve got to quit talking to people because every time I talk to somebody, then I talk to somebody and then it comes back to bite my butt.”
Sorenson is currently under investigation over allegations he was paid to work for Bachmann’s campaign, a violation of the ethics rules for state senators. Bachmann told reporters the day after Sorenson left her campaign that money was an issue.
A memo provided to www.TheIowaRepublican.com suggests the leader of the Iowa Gun Owners Association drafted the document to outline “salary requirements and other financial” obligations Sorenson wanted to receive from the Ron Paul campaign, including $8000-a-month payments “for the majority of 2012.”
Sorenson has called the documents fabrications. On his Facebook page, Sorenson wrote that he “cannot control what others say about me” and he looks forward to giving his tax statements to the investigator appointed to review the ethics complaint against him.