Joni Ernst lied about role in military rape investigation.
In recent days, Iowa Senate hopeful Joni Ernst has pitched herself as a leader-in-waiting on the hot-button issue of sexual assault in the military, telling Time that she experienced harassment firsthand while serving and calling for investigations into sexual misconduct to be removed from the chain of command.
But Ernst’s familiarity with the issue goes beyond that: A decade ago, when she was serving in the National Guard in Kuwait, a soldier under her command was accused of rape in a case that military investigators later deemed unfounded. And her role in the case is coming under scrutiny as the Republican state lawmaker is locked in an election that could tip the balance of power in the Senate.
Ernst told the accuser in 2012 that she had nothing to do with the probe by the Criminal Investigation Command, or CID. “I was not involved with the investigation — period,” she wrote in an email to the woman. But a document obtained by POLITICO shows that Ernst took statements at the scene and provided them to CID investigators.
Ernst’s campaign would not make the candidate available for an interview, but representatives denied any discrepancy. They acknowledged that Ernst collected statements from occupants of the accused man’s tent and gave them to investigators, but said she had no bearing on the investigation. While the statements Ernst took may have been used to check the consistency of witness accounts, the campaign representatives said, the CID conducted an independent probe and concluded on its own that the rape allegation was unfounded.
http://www.politico.com/story/2014/08/joni-ernsts-role-in-sex-assault-case-questioned-110333.html#ixzz3BZ4I0LXE