Rep. Michele Bachmann and former Gov. Tim Pawlenty are among a long list of presidential hopefuls attending the Faith & Freedom Conference and Strategy Briefing this weekend in Washington, D.C. The conference is organized by Ralph Reed, former head of the Christian Coalition and controversial religious right leader. In addition to Reed, Bachmann and Pawlenty will be sharing the stage with a number of controversial figures from the anti-abortion rights and anti-gay rights movements.

Reed led the Christian Coalition in the 1990s and stepped down as a scandal inside the organization was brewing. He then ran for the office of lieutenant governor in Georgia, but his ties to Jack Abramoff’s gambling scandal created huge hurdles for Reed and he lost the election.

Tom Schenk of Faith & Action will give Friday evening’s prayer. In 1992, Schenk was arrested after he threw a fetus at then-presidential candidate Bill Clinton. He has repeatedly questioned President Barack Obama’s Christian faith.

Speaking just before Bachmann will be Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, an anti–gay rights groups recently listed by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group. The SPLC has criticized Perkins for his past connections to white supremacy groups and his use of false data to impugn gays and lesbians.

Gary Bauer of American Values will also speak at the conference. He ran the Family Research Council before Perkins.

Also on the speakers list: Jay Sekulow a religious right attorney with a huge salary; Renewing America’s Jim Garlow, who likens fighting gay marriage to battling the Anti-Christ; and Dr. Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention. Land recently said that the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell opens America up to God’s punishment.

Religious right groups praised the House Rules Committee vote on Wednesday morning to pass an amendment that would codify a gay marriage ban in the Minnesota Constitution, but also called for action against “gay activists” who would “assault,” “attack” or “take one last shot” at Republican legislators. While conservative Christians rally the troops for a possible vote on the House floor this afternoon, Gov. Mark Dayton said he’d fight it “with every fiber of my being.”

The New Jersey-based National Organization for Marriage urged its supporters to rally at the Minnesota Capitol.

“Gay marriage advocates are mounting a furious last-minute assault on Republican legislators in an effort to cow them into delaying the vote authorizing the marriage amendment until sometime next year,” wrote the group’s executive director. “They are rallying supporters all around the country to contact Minnesota legislators asking them to stop the marriage amendment.”

Tony Perkins of the Washington, D.C.–based Family Research Council, an organization recently dubbed a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law center, sent an alert out as well:

The people of Minnesota deserve a full and open debate to decide the future of marriage. The only ones served by putting this vote off are gay marriage advocates, not Minnesota voters or Minnesota families.

As we speak, your state Representative is under attack by those opposed to allowing your voice to be heard. This bill is a direct threat to powerful interest groups, the small number of lawmakers who listen to them and the even smaller number of judges who are willing to foist a new definition of marriage on Minnesota.

The Catholic Defense League of Minnesota wrote about LGBT advocates “taking one last shot” at legislators:

Those of us who believe that the destruction of marriage is not only immoral but also extremely destructive of the social fabric of our country, have watched with hopeful anticipation as the bill wound its way through the legislature.

On Thursday, May 19 (tomorrow as I write this), the Minnesota House will likely take up the bill. Opposition forces such as Out Front Minnesota will be there to try to “take one last shot” at the legislators.

We have an opportunity, while investing minimal time, to fight back. As the legislators convene at the House chambers, there will be opposition forces there to try to intimidate them.

A vote on the amendment is expected on the House floor on Thursday afternoon. And LBGT advocates are planning a 2:30 rally at the Capitol to coincide with the vote.

Following a House committee vote on Wednesday to send the bill to the House floor, Gov. Dayton told reporters he would fight it “with every fiber of my being.”

Dayton has no power to veto the amendment, but he does have the bully pulpit.

“I think Minnesotans have much more compassion and understanding than they recognize and I think it will be defeated next year,” he said.

Rep. Steve Simon, DFL-St. Louis Park, briefly flirted with folk hero status in the LGBT community and beyond last week after comments he made in opposition to an anti–gay marriage amendment went viral. He asked, “How many gays must God create before we accept that he wants them around?” And with that increased attention, Simon has drawn the ire of religious right figures who have called him “evil” and a “blasphemer” who should be immediately removed from office.

Video of Rep. Simon’s remarks have generated just under 500,000 views on YouTube:

That footage drew harsh criticism from Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network and Exodus International, a group that says it can convert gays and lesbians to heterosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ.

Exodus International’s Randy Thomas questions Simon’s theology at the 9:30 mark:

“This is their life and they want your children,” said James White of the Alpha and Omega Ministries. “They can’t have them themselves so they’ll get them any way they can.”

“Those that are evil generally don’t sound evil,” he said of Simon’s remarks:

“Give me a stinkin’ break. That is blasphemy, Mr. Simon,” said Bradlee Dean of You Can Run But You Cannot Hide. In response to Simon’s remarks saying he believes God created gays and lesbians, Dean compared LGBT people to thieves, liars, adulterers and fornicators.

He mocked the idea that homosexuality may be an innate quality. “‘Oh, I was born this way. I can’t help myself.’ Really? Then you belong in jail.”

Jake McMillian, Dean’s sidekick, called for Simon to be removed from office. “He deserves to be kicked out of office and dethroned from his position.”

Dean agreed: “Immediately! He is violating your constitution, he is violating his oath, he is violating the God he’s supposed to serve and the people that he serves.”

He continued, “Blasphemy! But here the homosexuals are praising him. This guy is reprobate. He is off the radar folks. You need to be removed! Yes, I said it from the pulpit, you need to be removed!”

Here’s audio of Dean’s full remarks:

simondean

Rep. Michele Bachmann will be headlining a California-based religious right webcast on Mar. 26 along with Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich and Haley Barbour. The “Rediscover God in America” will be shown to churches around the country; so far only two Minnesota churches have signed up to show it. “It’s time to learn and understand what ‘One Nation Under God’ really means,” the program’s website states.

“History is clear: the founders of our country drew their inspiration, wisdom, and direction from the Bible,” the webcast promoters write. “Beginning in colonial times, church leaders spoke to their congregations about the events and issues of the day in the context of Biblical truth. Rediscover God in America will lay a foundation of critical knowledge for your congregation. They’ll learn how to interpret and assess current events in light of God’s Word, as our founding fathers did, and how to respond Biblically and take action that aligns with His truth.”

Rediscover America is part of United in Purpose, a conservative Christian organization that works to mobilize Christian voters.

In Minnesota, only two churches have signed up to show the webcast: United Methodist Church in New London and Jesus Assembly of God in St. Peter.

The Values Voter Summit is the premier gathering of the religious right each year, and it’s an event Tim Pawlenty will need to attend to shore up the support of social conservatives before the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary should he seek the GOP presidential nomination in 2012. But judging by the invitation page for the summit, Pawlenty may have his work cut out for him getting recognized: Instead of Pawlenty’s picture, the organizers posted that of Janet Parshall.

The mistake, spotted by blogger Jeremy Hooper, put Christian radio host Parshall in Pawlenty’s place. Parshall, on whose program Pawlenty appeared last month, is a believer in biblical literalism — that every word of the Christian Bible is true.

Pawlenty attended the Values Voter Summit in 2009 along with fellow Minnesotan Rep. Michele Bachmann. The summit this year won’t be without controversy: The American Family Association and the Family Research Council are both listed as ‘hate groups’ by the Southern Poverty Law Center and are hosts for the summit. The former has Bryan Fischer on staff who said this week that Native Americans have issues with alcohol and should give up their land because they aren’t Christians.

The controversial commentary — one of many made by Fischer — was too hot for the AFA and they yanked it from their websites on Wednesday.

Former Gov. Tim Pawlenty has spent the past few weeks trying to curry favor with a slew of conservative religious figures, some so extreme they’ve been labeled “hate groups” by the Southern Poverty Law Center. He’s gone public about his plan to reinstate of the military’s ban on openly gay and lesbian servicemembers if elected president and claimed that America was founded “under God.” While Pawlenty has always been a social conservative, he hasn’t worn it on his sleeve this prominently. But will these new friends help or hamper his likely 2012 bid for president?

This week Pawlenty kicked off a series  of presidential forums in Iowa with The Family Leader, a controversial conservative group that calls homosexuality a “public health crisis” and teaches “gay sex kills.” He also appeared on the radio show of Focus on the Family to talk about the Christian founding of America.

But perhaps the biggest turn to the right came in January when Pawlenty appeared on the radio show of Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association (AFA). Fischer is known for making incendiary comments that have landed his group on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s anti-gay hate groups list.

In the past week, Fischer has courted controversy: On Saturday he appeared on the radio show of Bradlee Dean of You Can Run But You Cannot Hide International ministries to say that “homosexuals” were responsible — at least indirectly — for the Holocaust. And on Tuesday, Fischer said that “many of the tribal reservations today remain mired in poverty and alcoholism” because Native Americans refuse to embrace Christianity.

To Kyle Mantyla, senior fellow at People for the American Way, it’s disappointing that Pawlenty is giving Fischer legitimacy, but it’s also not surprising.

“I’d like to say that it is remarkable that someone who is planning on running for president would agree to associate with the likes of Fischer, but the fact of the matter is that Fischer is a perfectly ‘respectable’ leader within the conservative, religious right movement,” he told the Minnesota Independent. “What would truly be remarkable is if someone like Pawlenty actually had the decency and courage to stand up to Fischer and refuse to tolerate and legitimize his unrelenting bigotry.”

Mantyla has been following Fischer’s career and his controversial remarks at Right Wing Watch for several years.

“Sadly, Fischer’s open bigotry against gays and Muslims is common within the religious right and perfectly acceptable to the conservative movement as a whole,” he said. “As such, Fischer is a regular participant at religious right events where he is often given a prominent speaking slot from which to spread his views, and Republican members of Congress regularly appear on his radio program.”

Though Pawlenty continues to court those whose views many find offensive, one of his challengers doubts he will go far enough to succeed. Rick Santorum told columnist George Will last week that he “doubts that Pawlenty has the passion requisite for connecting with values voters.”

For the Minnesota Republican, it’s a double-edged sword. He needs strong support from the religious right — including those who hold views many find offensive — in order to break out of the pack to win the GOP nomination. But, if he goes too far, it could turn off the moderate voters he’ll need to woo in a general election.

Hamline University political scientist David Schultz said Pawlenty “definitely has to start drifting to the right.”

“Where the real momentum is in the Republican Party is on the right,” he said in an interview with the Minnesota Independent. “The party is being pulled by the conservative tea party wing; they are really driving it, especially in Iowa.”

Schultz mentioned a recent graph created by Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight which showed Pawlenty dead center among all the presidential candidates in terms of conservatism and party insider status, not a good place for a candidate who wants to stand out. Contrast that with Rep. Michele Bachmann, a fellow Minnesotan rumored to be running in 2012. She sits on the far right side of the conservative spectrum and has hooked herself into the tea party movement.

“Pawlenty has to go to the right to find a narrative. He’s forced to, I think. He is a Reagan Republican in a party that has rebranded itself in a Palin-Bachmann-tea party manner, and he’s trying to rebrand himself to be part of the new wave when, in fact, he’s not a part of it.”

Bachmann, he said, faces a different problem in that her far right views might make her extremely popular with the base but not with a general election voter: “If somebody like Bachmann nails the nomination, how does she then turn on a dime?”

And that’s a problem Pawlenty could face as well if he tracks toward the extreme right in order to shore up a lackluster campaign, but can’t pivot in the general election.

In 1964, Republican Barry Goldwater lost in a landslide to Lyndon B. Johnson mainly because the Democrats were successful in branding him a right-winger. Schultz says the 2012 election could shape up the same way if the GOP continues to lean right and President Barack Obama gains centrist credibility.

“Obama has reinvented himself as a centrist,” Schultz said, adding that the GOP could fracture during the nomination battle. “One question is: Does Bachmann run as an independent if she doesn’t get the nomination?”

Obama is no stranger to controversy surrounding religious associates. His former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, became a campaign issue in 2008 when some saw his sermons to be extreme. Obama had to distance himself from Wright. Will Pawlenty need to do the same?

Perhaps, but so far he doesn’t seem to be. Pawlenty has defended Fischer and other SPLC-dubbed “hate groups,” and in Iowa earlier this week, he was asked by reporters about the designation of several religious right groups as “hate groups.”

“I certainly disagree with the notion that the… Family Research Council is a hate group,” Pawlenty said at a Feb. 7 Iowa City press conference with The Family Leader’s Bob VanderPlaats. “I think the Southern Poverty Law Center is out of line for coming to that conclusion.”

And late last year, Pawlenty signed an open letter saying that the SPLC was attacking groups “that uphold Judeo-Christian moral views, including marriage as the union of a man and a woman.”

His letter did not address the claims that the SPLC made in designating those organizations as hate groups — that they intentionally spread falsehoods about Muslims, LGBT people, Native Americans and other Americans.

Lynda Waddington of the Iowa Independent contributed to this report.

Rep. Michele Bachmann has added religious right attorney Jay Sekulow to her list of instructors at her Tea Party Caucus constitutional classes. Sekulow is the head of the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), a conservative religious law group televangelist Pat Robertson founded because he thought the American Civil Liberties Union was “hostile to traditional American values.” Sekulow joins Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and controversial history revisionist David Barton as an invitee of Bachmann to teach the courses.

Sekulow got his start by founding Christian Advocates Serving Evangelism (CASE) in 1990 to ensure the religious right has a voice in court cases involving the separation of church and state and abortion cases.

“I look for every opportunity God gives me in the courtroom to share the gospel,” he once said, adding that the religious right has a “cultural mandate” to change society in God’s image. “By whatever ethical means necessary, we need to engage in this struggle,” he said.

Sekulow’s work has come under some criticism from the legal community who see his legal empire as a way to support his “high-flying lifestyle.”

According to a 2005 profile in Legal Times, “Sekulow, through the ACLJ and a string of interconnected nonprofit and for-profit entities, has built a financial empire that generates millions of dollars a year and supports a lavish lifestyle — complete with multiple homes, chauffeur-driven cars, and a private jet that he once used to ferry Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.”

Bachmann was on Sekulow’s radio show on Thursday and invited him to teach her courses, according to People for the American Way’s Right Wing Watch:

Bachmann: Our opening speaker was Justice Antonin Scalia. We had both Democrats and Republicans – we had four Democrat members of Congress. It was very civil, it was very open and we hope to invite all of the Supreme Court Justices to come and speak to us. But we also hope to have people like yourself, Jay – we’ve invited you to come and speak to members of Congress, to speak about the Constitution. The topic will be up to the speakers choice but the whole purpose and intent is to have members thinking about the Constitution and our limitations under the Constitution. That has not been a focus here in Congress in recent years. We intend to change that and this was a very good first meeting this week.

Sekulow: I look forward to participating [and] we appreciate you’re not only representing the people of your district, you’re representing all of use that share the concerns and the desire to see Constitutional Conservatism placed forward and Congresswoman, thanks for being with us and thanks for the bold stand you are taking in Washington.

Bachmann: Thank you. You’re wonderful and thank you for your ministry.

When Rep. Michele Bachmann’s office declined to rule out a 2012 bid for the Republican nomination for president, religious right leaders responded with glee at what they say could be the next Ronald Reagan — except “swap boots for pumps.” Bachmann has long had a strong relationship with the religious right, and one of the first Iowa Republican caucus polls to include Bachmann show her taking away from two traditional religious right favorites: Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee.

Matt Barber, of the late Jerry Fallwell’s Liberty Council, gushed over a possible President Bachmann:

From the instant his fruitful eight-year reign ended, Republicans have pined for the next Ronald Reagan. To date, no man has succeeded in filling the conservative standard-bearer’s legendary boots. Well, maybe it’s time to swap boots for pumps. Could he be a she?

Forget a Senate run. The buzz inside the Beltway is that Mrs. Bachmann may be looking to add a woman’s touch to the Oval Office (beyond just sprucing up its temporary occupant’s eyesore decor). Her spokesman, Doug Sachtleben, has confirmed to media that the congresswoman is considering a potential presidential run, saying: “Nothing’s off the table.”

Mrs. Bachmann has been a stalwart in advocating on behalf of constitutional conservatism. She’s chairman of the House Tea Party Caucus and has put her money where her mouth is, voting consistently in Congress to limit the size and scope of government, fortify national security and protect life, liberty and the natural family. National Journal rated Mrs. Bachmann among the most conservative members of Congress in 2009.

Moreover, as with Reagan, it’s principle over popularity with the feminine firebrand. She’s evidently indifferent to what the moonbat media and the larger loony left think about her. This is an indispensable quality in a leader “We the People” can get behind. She’s a maverick’s maverick, not the media’s.

Larry Klayman, the former founder of Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch:

Still smug that it can retain the White House in 2012, even after President Obama has alienated most of the nation with his socialist, anti-white and anti-Judeo-Christian policies, the left has set out to destroy the one truly principled politician who can unite conservatives, libertarians, independents, tea partiers, people of faith and any American who truly believes in constrained government, fiscal and individual responsibility, a strong national defense, life, and yes, freedom under God! Her name is Michele Bachmann, and she is a congresswoman from Minnesota.

Michele Bachmann, because she is a principled anti-establishment conservative who not only talks the talk but walks the walk, is a real threat to the establishment left in particular. An attractive anti-feminist woman who is a Christian and is not afraid to be part of our revolution to take Washington apart at the seams, she could well be the next president of the United States. And, not only is the left scared, so much so that it will disgrace itself by mocking a highly intelligent, well-educated and experienced straight female who believes in individual freedom and the vision of our Founding Fathers, it is catatonic. This in and of itself tells us who the next Ronald Reagan could well be.

Joseph Farah, a “birther” and founder of the conservative WorldNetDaily, called Bachmann a “great communicator,” conjuring one of Reagan’s nicknames:

Americans demonstrated in 2010 they don’t revere career politicians. They prefer principled public servants – and that’s what Michele Bachmann represents to me and millions of other Americans before she ever makes her final decision about seeking the presidency.

She’s down to earth. She’s passionate about her beliefs. She’s attractive physically and in personality. She’s smart. She’s funny. And she is uncompromisingly principled.

Michele Bachmann exudes leadership – and that’s one of the reasons her opponents fear her.

People ask me all the time who would be best to succeed Obama in 2012. What America needs is a breath of fresh air. We don’t need any retreads. We don’t need any failed presidential candidates from the past.

What we need is someone like Michele Bachmann, a great communicator who knows what she believes in without equivocation, someone who knows how to stand up to the Beltway establishment and emerge unchanged by it.

I don’t know who else might be running. But we need at least one independent, feisty, fiery candidate like Michele Bachmann. If there is someone like her in the race, we can rest assured that we will have the opportunity to throw off the shackles placed upon the American people by the Obama regime and then some.

Is my goal simply getting America back to where we were the day Obama entered office? No.

It’s time to restore America to the constitutional principles that made it great.

It’s time to restore America to the principles of self-government.

It’s time to restore America as a sovereign, independent nation under the rule of law and the will of the people.

It will take extraordinary leadership to seize this momentous opportunity.

I have every confidence Michele Bachmann is one leader up to that task.

Rep. Michele Bachmann announced last month that she wants to hold “Constitution classes” for new members of Congress in the hopes of preventing them from being “co-opted into the Washington system.” She’s already announced several people she wants to teach the classes, including David Barton, a controversial figure whose ideas about the Constitution and the founding fathers have drawn sharp criticism from both the religious and secular communities.

“Every week the hour before we take our first votes, we have our weekly class so that we are reminded of our constitutional jurisdictional limits,” Bachmann told Glenn Beck in a recent radio interview. She mentioned Barton as a key figure in those weekly classes.

Bachmann and Barton have a long relationship going back to Bachmann’s time as state senator. Barton was invited to Minnesota to help Bachmann with legislation on school history standards, she’s appeared his radio show numerous times, and she and Barton have conducted tours in Washington, D.C., to demonstrate to tea partiers how religious the Founding Fathers were.

But Barton, who has said the idea of separation of church and state is a myth, has garnered his fair share of controversy. He has suggested the federal government should regulate homosexuality, and his association with reported anti-Semitic groups prompted the Anti-Defamation League to condemn him earlier this year. In the 1990s, he spoke to the Christian Identity Movement, a group that “asserts that Jews are ‘the synagogue of Satan’; that Blacks and other people of color are subhuman; and that northern European whites and their American descendants are the ‘chosen people’ of scriptural prophesy.”

He has called holding congressional sessions on Sunday unconstitutional and he has stated that United States borders were drawn by God.

“God’s the one who drew up the lines for the nations, so to say open borders is to say, ‘God, you goofed it all up and when you had borders, you shouldn’t have done it,’” he said recently on his radio program. “And so, from a Christian standpoint, you cannot do that. God’s the one who establishes the boundaries of nations.”

His point: God condemns illegal immigration.

Barton has come under intense criticism for what many have called revisionist history and using unverified quotes from the nation’s founders to promote the idea that the U.S. Constitution calls for America to be a Christian nation.

The Baptist General Association of Virginia passed a resolution last week saying in part, “Whereas, the Baptist principles of religious liberty and its safeguard, separation of church and state (or government neutrality toward all religions and nonreligion), are well grounded in this nation’s history.”

The group singled out the work of David Barton in its resolution, calling him inaccurate and urging it’s members not to read his work.

Evangelical Christian filmmaker Chris Pinto released a film in October debunking many of Barton’s assertions about America being founded as a Christian nation.

“The reason that men like David Barton want to take the founders and go into churches and try and convince you that these guys were Christians is because they want you to become entangled in the politics of this world,” Pinto told Christianity Today last week.

Here’s Pinto taking on Barton’s claims:

Bachmann and Barton have given guided tours of the U.S. Capitol to show “the foundational role God has played throughout American history” for tea partiers. The duo have worked together for many years.

Barton came to Minnesota in 2005 to help Bachmann shape the state’s “history standards.” Bachmann wanted to make sure that references to religion in historical documents were taught in Minnesota’s public schools. Barton came to the Minnesota Senate to give a presentation at Bachmann’s invitation.

In a 2008 interview with Barton, Bachmann said, “It’s important for your listeners to know that there are strong, believing members of Congress who get it about our nation’s heritage and we love and appreciate David Barton.”

She added, “I’ve probably been on four of his Spiritual Heritage tours at the Capitol, and the staff knows, whenever David’s going to be in town doing one, if I can get over there, I want to go because I learn something new every time I’m going through one of his tours. He’s a treasure for our nation.”

Kyle Mantyla, senior fellow with People For the American Way, has been tracking Barton’s career — and the criticism he’s generated from both the right and left.

“That Rep. Bachmann would possibly tap someone like David Barton to teach this class is in no way surprising, since Bachmann clearly has no desire to gain a true understanding of the Constitution and is looking instead for an opportunity to pass off right-wing propaganda as scholarship,” Mantyla told the Minnesota Independent. “As such Barton is the perfect teacher for her effort. In fact, only Bachmann would consider having a class on the Constitution taught by a man whose academic credentials consist entirely of a B.A. from Oral Roberts University and an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from Pensacola Christian College.’”

Mantyla points to a PFAW report on Barton that includes criticism from several important sources. Barton’s work has been unfavorably criticized by the Institute of Church-State Studies at Baylor University, History professor Richard Pierard of Indiana State University, the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and the Texas Freedom Network.

Former Republican Senator Arlen Specter wrote in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy that Barton’s “pseudoscholarship would hardly be worth discussing, let alone disproving, were it not for the fact that it is taken so very seriously by so many people.”

The classes will be a part of the new Constitutional Conservative Caucus that Bachmann intends to start. It would be separate from the Tea Party Caucus that she founded in the U.S. House earlier this year.

“Scholars such as David Barton, members of the media who cherish [the founding] principles such as [Fox News host] Sean Hannity, honorable commentators such as Judge [Andrew] Napolitano, honorable judges and justices, and leading legal minds will and have been invited to speak,” Brooke Bialke, Bachmann’s deputy chief of staff, told AOL News. “Topics ranging from the commerce clause to the intersection of constitutional principles with daily concerns such as Medicare will be covered.”

A trio of judicial candidates who were backed by the Republican Party of Minnesota and tea party groups was defeated at the polls on Tuesday. Supreme Court candidates Greg Wersal and Tim Tingelstad were projected to lose by more than 20 points, and Appeals Court candidate Dan Griffith appeared to lose his challenge by about 4 points.

The three candidates had courted controversy by answering questions on the Minnesota Family Council judicial questionnaire — the only three candidates in the state to do so — and were active in partisan politics. Each said they opposed court decisions in favor or abortion rights or LGBT rights and had spoken at tea party events over the last few months.

Wersal lost to incumbent Minnesota Supreme Court Justice Helen Meyer; Tingelstad lost to Justice Alan Page; and Griffith just barely lost to Appellate Judge Larry Stauber.

Those races were also a loss for a new conservative political action committee, Justice in Minnesota, which had been backing the three candidates.