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WHO IS KATIE BARGE?: Profile of a Schumergate Conspirator

by Richard Poe
Friday, September 30, 2005

6:12 pm Eastern Time
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The Schumergate conspirators appear to have settled on a scapegoat. She is Katie Barge, former research director for Senator Charles “Chuck” Schumer’s Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC). Miss Barge faces a possible two years in federal prison and a $250,000 fine. Her former boss Chuck Schumer does not appear to be in any legal jeopardy whatsoever.

As previously noted on this blog, FBI investigators are probing Miss Barge and her deputy Lauren Weiner for illegally obtaining a credit report on Maryland’s lieutenant governor Michael S. Steele, a black Republican. Barge undertook this operation on behalf of the DSCC.

Barge and Weiner resigned from the DSCC early this month, after two months’ paid leave and an “internal investigation.” DSCC chairman Senator Schumer claims that he personally gave the order to report their illegal conduct to the authorities. The crime was an “isolated incident” caused by youthful overzealousness, states Schumer’s flack.

Miss Barge is undeniably youthful. She graduated Wesleyan University of Middletown, Connecticut in 2001. However, in her brief professional life, she has acquired an impressive track record as a political dirt-digger.

Miss Barge’s official bio from former employer Media Matters states that she has held a “range of research positions” on “presidential, gubernatorial, and senatorial campaigns.” (via SourceWatch.org)

She served as opposition research director for Senator John Edwards (D-NC), during Edwards’ short-lived presidential bid, which lasted from September 16, 2003 to March 3, 2004.

The young investigator next surfaced in a New York Times feature of May 3, 2004 announcing the launch of David Brock’s Media Matters for America (MMFA). The article noted that Brock’s new research director Katie Barge “sat before a bank of computers and televisions in a room that was otherwise dark,” supervising her “team of nearly a half-dozen researchers.” It continues:

“Some of the researchers wore headphones as they scanned episodes of cable news programs stored on digital recording devices, among them `Hannity & Colmes’ on Fox News Channel, `Dennis Miller’ on CNBC and `Scarborough Country’ on MSNBC. Two researchers have been assigned to cover Mr. Limbaugh, whose program they will regularly transcribe.”

But Miss Barge was destined for bigger and better things. In February 2005, Schumer’s DSCC hired her as research director. The DSCC works to elect Democrats to the U.S. Senate. In her new job, young Miss Barge now found herself supervising opposition research (that is, political dirt-digging) for every U.S. Senate race in the country.

It was in that capacity, in July, that Miss Barge and her deputy Lauren Weiner used Steele’s social security number to illegally obtain a copy of his credit report, in the process violating the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act.

If prosecuted, Miss Barge will need top-drawer legal advice. To that end, she has retained William E. Lawler III, the $420-per-hour criminal defense attorney who represented disgraced former New Jersey Governor James McGreevey. Lawler works from the Washington DC office of the Houston-based law firm Vinson & Elkins, LLP. (hat tip, RedState.org)

For more details, see, “Schumergate: The Brock Connection.”

by Richard Poe
September 30, 2005 06:12 PM ET

Cross-posted from MoonbatCentral.com 09.30.05

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15 Responses to “WHO IS KATIE BARGE?: Profile of a Schumergate Conspirator”

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  1. rightwingmac says:

    Does this mean that GW and Cheney will be exonerated for the Plame leak?

    (yea we know the answer to that lol)

  2. freda2996 says:

    You CAN’T be relying on SourceWatch to check out this babe. Those left-wing MOONBATS hate Israel and think Hamas is legit, for starters. They also HATE David Horowitz. Please tell me you are kidding.

  3. Richard Poe says:

    freda2996 writes: “You CAN’T be relying on SourceWatch to check out this babe.”

    You’re right. I’m not relying on SourceWatch.

    It happens that all the information currently posted on SourceWatch regarding Katie Barge is true, as I know from multiple independent sources.

    I linked to it, for my readers’ convenience, because it is the closest thing on the Internet right now to a coherent professional biography of Katie Barge.

  4. Rightminded says:

    Richard Poe writes: “She served as opposition research director for Senator John Edwards ***(D-SC)***, during Edwards’ short-lived presidential bid, which lasted from September 16, 2003 to March 3, 2004.”

    Actually, this is a typo. This sophisticated amb-a-lance chaser is a (D) from (NC). (NC) has so many more (D’s) than (SC). They also have so many more (SOM’s).

  5. Richard Poe says:

    Rightminded writes: “Actually, this is a typo. This sophisticated amb-a-lance chaser is a (D) from (NC).”

    Oops. You’re right. I’ll fix it.

  6. Palmetto says:

    Yeah, please don’t lump him in my state of SC. He is sickening.

  7. Rightminded says:

    Richard Poe writes: “Her former boss Chuck Schumer does not appear to be in any legal jeopardy whatsoever.”

    That’s a pity!

    However, be that as it may, he is more than responsible for establishing the environment that motivates people like this young lady to “walk on the illegal side” for the benefit of the DNC.

    Perhaps if the time comes when she is seriously looking at two years in prison, she will start flapping those lips, and not want to take the entire fall for Chucky and all the rest of the brides of Chucky that have not been caught yet.

  8. tazzmax says:

    You can bet that SOB Schumer is the snake at the bottom of the pit!

    The Republicans need to start playing hard ball and hire some investigator to dig up the sh-t on this bastard!

    Chuckie “steal-my-guns” Schumer is right in the middle of all this and no one will ever convince me otherwise.

  9. drmiltown says:

    Is it true that Republicans don’t play the dirt digging game? I can’t believe it.

    Doc

  10. Richard Poe says:

    drmiltown asks: “Is it true that Republicans don’t play the dirt digging game?”

    This is not about dirt-digging.

    Dirt-digging is unsavory, but legal. Identity theft is a federal felony.

    I’m glad I was able to clear that up for you.

  11. Publius says:

    However, the democ-rats have a much easier time at dirt digging, as they have their press organ the leftstream media doing most of it for them.

  12. nanc says:

    dirt digging is easy publius, when your mind is like a shovel.

    happy rosh hashanah everyone – salvation is of the jews!

  13. The Shadow Party » Blog Archive » WHO IS KATIE BARGE? says:

    […] Cross-posted from MoonbatCentral.com of 9/30/05 […]

  14. The Wide Awake Cafe » Not One Mention says:

    […] This head of the Democrat Senatorial Campaign Committee had staffers who used a social security number to illegally obtain a credit report for Lieutenant Governor Michael S. Steele, a Republican, African American and possible candidate for governor in Maryland……..Known to trample other senators to get to any microphone/television camera first. […]

  15. POE.com » Blog Archive » WHO IS KATIE BARGE?: Profile of a Schumergate Conspirator says:

    […] Cross-posted from MoonbatCentral.com 09.30.05 […]



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