TPM reports that Northwestern Iowa Rep. Steve King: [says] I’ve Never Heard Of A Girl Getting Pregnant From Statutory Rape Or Incest. Bluestem recommends that he cross the Iowa-Minnesota border and meet former Governor Tim Pawlenty's most famous pardon extraordinary recipient, Jeremy Giefer.
Evan McMorris Santoro reports for TPM:
Rep. Steve King, one of the most staunchly conservative members of the House, was one of the few Republicans who did not strongly condemn Rep. Todd Akin Monday for his remarks regarding pregnancy and rape. King also signaled why — he might agree with parts of Akin’s assertion.
King told an Iowa reporter he’s never heard of a child getting pregnant from statutory rape or incest.
“Well I just haven’t heard of that being a circumstance that’s been brought to me in any personal way,” King told KMEG-TV Monday, “and I’d be open to discussion about that subject matter.”
A Democratic source flagged King’s praise of Akin in the KMEG interview to TPM. But potentially more controversial for King is his suggestion that pregnancies from statutory rape or incest don’t exist or happen rarely. A 1996 review by the Guttmacher Institute found “at least half of all babies born to minor women are fathered by adult men.”
King ordinarily venues into Southern Minnesota to demogogue about immigration or to rally Southern Minnesota Republicans. Perhaps they can introduce Representative King to Mr. Giefer, who fathered a child with a minor in the 1990s.
As the City Pages reported in December 2010:
In 1993, Giefer, then 19 years old, had fathered a daughter with his girlfriend, who was only 14 years old at the time of conception. He pleaded guilty to statutory rape, but claimed to the Star Tribune that he was being unfairly singled out for sticking around and supporting his girlfriend when other men would have bolted.
Giefer served 45 days in jail for the transgression, and 15 years later asked for a pardon extraordinary, the term for a pardon granted to someone who has already served the sentence for the crime they committed. With a pardon extraordinary, Giefer would no longer have to report his conviction, except in special circumstances.
Pawlenty and the board granted the Giefer's request, citing the fact that Giefer was still married to the woman he had statutorily raped, and was raising their children together. . . .
Giefer's earlier pardon for a 1993 statutory rape became newsworthy when he was accused of sexually assaulting a female relative, as Pinto reported in Jeremy Giefer could be Tim Pawlenty's Willie Horton after Bluestem first connected the dots between the late 2010 charges and the earlier conviction and pardon. In December 2011, the Jeremy Giefer charges [were] dismissed as victim recants sexual assault allegations.
That the more recent charges against Giefer were dismissed doesn't change the fact that as an adult man he did indeed father a child with a minor, and that the circumstances of her early teen pregnancy was not exceptional, according to the Guttmacher Institute statistics.
Photo: Tim Pawlenty, who might be able to help explain this conception thing to Rep. King.
I remember thinking, when I first heard King's remarks, that he obviously never met Jeremy Giefer's child bride or the daughter he fathered with her when she was fourteen.
Shoulda known you'd be thinking that, too. Thanks!
Posted by: Phoenix Woman | Aug 22, 2012 at 10:56 AM