FBI Whistle-Blower Coleen Rowley to Run for Congress

FBI Whistle-Blower to Run for Congress (AP)

Former FBI whistle-blower Coleen Rowley will run for Congress as a Democrat in Minnesota’s 2nd Congressional District, where she hopes to knock off GOP Rep. John Kline.

“I’m concerned about the direction of the country,” Rowley said in a telephone interview Tuesday. “We have done things that have made us less safe, among them the Iraq invasion and the loss of our allies and the moral high ground in international affairs.”

Rowley, 50, was named one of Time magazine’s Persons of the Year for 2002 after writing a critical memo on FBI intelligence failures.

She had sought a seat this year on the new Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, designed to ensure that government actions in the war on terror do not infringe on people’s rights. But when
President Bush appointed members of the board earlier this month, Rowley’s name was not on the list. She said that was a factor in deciding to run for Congress.

Rowley will face an uphill campaign in a conservative district that Kline won by 16 percentage points last year. Also, Kline’s opponent in that race, Teresa Daly, might run again. Daly did not return phone messages Tuesday, but her 2004 campaign manager, Darin Broton, said, “If I was betting, I’d say she will run.”

Interesting. My guess is that having written a memo leaking classified information will be a rather poor springboard for knocking off an incumbent Congressman.

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James Joyner
About James Joyner
James Joyner is Professor and Department Head of Security Studies at Marine Corps University's Command and Staff College. He's a former Army officer and Desert Storm veteran. Views expressed here are his own. Follow James on Twitter @DrJJoyner.

Comments

  1. Mark says:

    So she is mad Bush did not appoint her to some board? That’s rather “Mark Felt” of her I would think!

  2. Maggie says:

    Are you kidding me? She’ll probably get elected in a landslide….she’ll fit right in ….Washington, D.C., will embrace her as their new Wunderkind.

  3. McGehee says:

    “Moral high ground” only makes us safer among people who have morals. If it isn’t accompanied by the willingness to use force against force, “moral high ground” constitutes a big, flashing neon sign to the terrorists, begging them to come get us.