Tracking in style today. #corvette pic.twitter.com/GlGVNoU8bi
— Ethan Hellier (@EthanLHellier) July 16, 2014
Bluestem bows at the audacity of House Republican caucus executive director Ben Golnik's sense of irony.
Looking over the latest iteration of committee staff assignments, we paused at staffing on the Ethics Committee's page:
Staff
Committee Administrator: Craig Stone 651-296-[redacted]Committee Legislative Assistant: Ethan Hellier 651-296-[redacted]
Minnesota political junkies may remember Ethan Hellier's last job: tracker for the Minnesota Jobs Coalition IE PAC.
One of the choice moments in Hellier's career came during a League of Women Voters candidate forum in Willmar. West Central Tribune staff writer Carolyn Lange reported in Two candidates each for House seat 17A and 17B debate Monday:
Videographer with Minnesota Jobs Coalition contests rule
The District 17 candidate forum Monday was temporarily stopped shortly after it began when Jessica Rohloff, chapter president of the League of Women Voters of the Willmar area, announced that an individual from the Minnesota Jobs Coalition had refused to comply with the League's rules that only the local media was allowed to record the forum.
Because the organization -- which was represented by a young man with a video camera -- had challenged the rule and was allowed to record the event, Rohloff announced that others in the audience could do the same.
In later comments, a clearly frustrated Rohloffs said the rule was made in an attempt to prevent the forum from being disrupted by "outside" political action groups that have been actively campaigning in District 17.
Candidates from District 17A and 17B have been the target of negative campaign advertisements from both GOP and DFL political groups that aren't directly tied to the candidates and their individual campaigns.
The Minnesota Jobs Coalition, which was at the forum on Monday, is actively campaigning against local DFL candidates.
Note how the Willmar League didn't try to kick Hellier out, but instead opened recording the forum to everyone who wanted to do so.
We've edited audio from KWLM's file of the forum into the YouTube below, in which Rohloff lifts the rules, followed by a jump to Republican Dave Baker, now an assistant majority leaderin the Minnesota House, expressing his dismay at Hellier being at the Forum and the Minnesota Jobs Coalition:
We''ll post a transcript in a bit, but we're saddened to see Baker and the caucus he helps lead so quickly embrace the Minnesota Jobs Coalition staff that once so disappointed him.
Heaven alone knows why the caucus hired people who make Baker sad.
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Poor Mr. Baker. It must hurt to know that he doesn't have as much control over his own office as does Ben Golnik and Golnik's pet James O'Keefe wannabee, Ethan Hellier. (Can pink fuzzy handcuffs and borrowed yachts be far behind?)
Posted by: Phoenix Woman | Jan 11, 2015 at 09:17 PM