Minnesota Independent

CNN: Bachmann’s Planned Parenthood claim is false

By Andy Birkey | 04.13.11 | 11:40 am

CNN’s Anderson Cooper fact-checked Rep. Michele Bachmann’s remarks about Planned Parenthood on Tuesday, particularly Bachmann’s repeated claims that “Planned Parenthood wants to be the LensCrafters of Big Abortion.” Cooper found that claim, during a social conservative gathering for potential presidential candidates, to be incorrect. The Minnesota Independent’s check on that claim last year came to a similar conclusion.

Bachmann on her claim about Obama India trip: I never said I believed it

By Andy Birkey | 11.22.10 | 1:27 pm

In an interview with the BBC on Friday, Rep. Michele Bachmann responded to criticism she’s received over her claims that President Barack Obama spent $200 million a day during a recent trip to India. Bachmann defended the statement, saying she was just quoting a newspaper and that she never said she believed it.

Using inaccurate figure, Bachmann calls Obama’s India trip ‘massive overspending’

By Paul Schmelzer | 11.04.10 | 10:34 am

CNN’s Anderson Cooper had a straightforward question for Rep. Michele Bachmann last night: Now that Republicans have the majority in the U.S. House, what spending cuts will they make to balance the budget? Republicans have talked about dismantling the Department of Energy, the Department of Education and doing away with corporate income tax. While Bachmann refused to name any specific programs she’d cut, she did have one case of “massive overspending”: President Obama’s upcoming trip to India. One problem with that: The cost of the trip she repeatedly cites is massively overestimated.

Can we please give the Senate seat to the ‘Crazy McCain Lady’?

By Paul Demko | 01.01.09 | 7:00 am

Thanks for the memories. Now please go away. Yes, we’re talking about you, Rudy Giuliani. And you, Wolf Blitzer. We no longer wish to be a swing state. Henceforth the residents of the state of Minnesota promise to vote reliably Democratic. Or Republican. It doesn’t much matter which — just as long as you people promise to stop showing up in our little slice of the frozen tundra seeking to feel our pain. But to memorialize the horrors visited upon us during the (still ongoing) campaign season, we offer — in honor of our favorite member of the Statewide General Election Canvassing Board — the G. Barry Anderson Awards.

Recount Day 9: Challenges fall amid reports of newly found ballots

By Chris Steller | 12.02.08 | 9:29 pm

The campaigns of Democrat Al Franken and Republican Norm Coleman slowed their ballot challenges on Tuesday in Minnesota’s U.S. Senate election recount, setting aside only 60 ballots of the 36,238 recounted for future review by the State Canvassing Board. That suggests that Secretary of State Mark Ritchie’s message about reining in challenges may have gotten through to the rival camps. But with U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss’s win putting a Democratic 60-vote majority in the Senate out of reach, whither CNN’s Anderson Cooper?