Via ThinkProgress comes news of the Michele Bachmann campaign's open and aggressive snubbing of a local media outlet for daring to ask about reparative therapy being practiced at the clinic owned by Bachmann and her husband, Marcus.
In a prior satellite interview (video here), WQAD's (ABC's Quad City affiliate based in Davenport, Iowa) Rae Chelle Davis asked Bachmann about an undercover report allegedly showing reparative therapy being practiced at one of the clinics owned by the Bachmann's. While candidate Bachmann was avoiding the question, Bachmann staffers were threatening to cut the feed should Davis ask a follow up. To her credit, Davis followed up anyway.
During the satellite interview, behind the scenes, it got ugly. In the News 8 control room, campaign staffers threatened WQAD producers that they would cut off the feed if Rae Chelle repeated the question. A follow-up question was asked on the issue. The Congresswoman's answers were aired nationally on ABC World News Tonight and Nightline.
Link
The result? The Bachmann campaign '"openly, and aggressively denied News 8 access to the Iowa Republican front-runner” as retribution against the station for asking Bachmann about reparative therapy.'
At Sunday's Davenport fundraiser was our first chance to interview Bachmann since the satellite interview incident. All Quad Cities media were invited to attend and promised a one-on-one interview during the evening. While our competitors were accommodated, WQAD was blocked and denied.
"One of her staffers said, 'due to the interview last week WQAD would not have an interview.' He said we would have to get our audio from a pool camera.
(snip)
McClurg began rolling his camera as another local Quad Cities news station started asking their questions.
"I started to tape something off of that interview and a staffer pushed me aside and stood in front of my camera and said that this was for the other station only."
The reporter asked a question about Bachmann's clinic and her husband. At that point, McClurg says the staffer took the microphone off of Bachmann, tossed it to the reporter and said their interview was over.
Link
So... is this how the Bachmann campaign is going to respond to an uncooperative press? Is this how they're going to handle unfavorable coverage? If so, she better start limiting her access to Fox News right now because as the saying goes - "Politics ain't beanbag." Should she be the nominee, the press is really going to start to dig into her past and I don't see things getting any easier for her then.
You can see video of the WQAD report on the snubbing here and listen to the firsthand account of the photojournalist here.