Hatch denies forcing Entenza out of race

07/26/2006

BY BILL SALISBURY
Pioneer Press

Minnesota Attorney General Mike Hatch on Wednesday vehemently denied he had anything to do with pushing state Rep. Matt Entenza out of the race to succeed him.

“I have not been involved in this thing,” Hatch said in his first interview since Entenza, the Democratic-Farmer-Labor-endorsed candidate for attorney general, became embroiled in a controversy over his wife’s job and Republican attacks on his integrity. Entenza withdrew from the race Tuesday.

After he stepped down, state Republican Party Chairman Ron Carey called on Hatch, the DFL-endorsed candidate for governor, to explain his involvement in the affair.

Hatch said he didn’t get involved until last week when it became apparent that Entenza was in deep trouble. Entenza had spent several days explaining and correcting statements about why he hired a Chicago political research firm last year to investigate Hatch.

The controversy peaked Monday when an anonymous source sent news outlets documents purporting to show that Lois Quam, a UnitedHealth Group executive, gave money to two South Dakota political action committees that routed the contributions to the Democratic Party in South Dakota and then to the Minnesota DFL Party. From there, according to the documents, the money went to a Minnesota House DFL campaign committee that her husband led.

State DFL Chairman Brian Melendez said there was nothing illegal or even improper about the exchange of money between the two state parties. And in response to the anonymous documents, Entenza issued a mildly worded statement that said unnamed opponents had “tried to land a few hits” on him.

Hatch said he had nothing to do with that anonymous message and he doesn’t know who did.

“Why would I do it anonymously?” he asked. “My biggest problem is I do too many things up front. I’m not that cute about things.”

His biggest concern for more than a year, he said, was that Entenza was closely linked with UnitedHealth Group, a Minnetonka company under investigation for allegedly backdating stock options.

He said he was concerned that Entenza would not be able to maintain the attorney general’s office as a strong watchdog of the health care industry.

That’s why last fall he encouraged other potential candidates to seek the DFL endorsement for attorney general.

But when no one challenged Entenza before the start of this year, Hatch said he stopped encouraging other candidates to run.

On July 3, he said, he attended a fundraising reception hosted by former U.S. Rep. Bill Luther where other people encouraged the ex-congressman to run. While he told Luther it was a great job, he said, he did not recall urging him to run.

When the controversy about Entenza erupted last week, Hatch said, two reporters told his press secretary, Leslie Sandberg, that they believed Entenza was lying about his political research and they would “write stories about him until he drops out.” Hatch declined to identify the journalists or the media outlets for which they worked.

“At that point, I thought it was a pretty good idea to be recruiting somebody” to run in case Entenza withdrew, he said. He asked Luther and Lori Swanson, his top assistant in the attorney general’s office, to “figure this out.” Both filed to run after Entenza dropped out.

Hatch said he did not talk with Entenza and insisted he did nothing to push him out of the race.