ABC News probes gay 'cure' claims about Bachmann clinic
By MAGGIE HABERMAN | 7/11/11 7:04 PM EDT Updated: 7/11/11 7:58 PM EDT
The questions about Michele Bachmann's husband's crisis clinic - and reports its services including helping to "cure" homosexuals - went mainstream tonight, with an ABC News story featuring undercover video shot of one of the center's counselors saying it's "possible" to be "totally free" of such feelings.
The "World News" report included an interview with a former patient at the clinic, who told the ABC reporter that he'd been sent there when he was 17 years old to try to "change" him.
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"[One counselor's] path for my therapy would be to read the Bible, pray to God that I would no longer be gay," Ramirez, who went to Bachmann & Associates in 2004, "And God would forgive me if I were straight."
The reports - denied repeatedly by the Bachmanns - have been circulating for years. But the ABC News story included undercover video of a counselor shot by a member of the advocacy group "Truth Wins Out."
The counselor, in the video, is seen telling the patient - who, according to the report, said he was a gay man who wanted to be "cured" of homosexuality - that "God has designed our eyes (for you) to you be attracted to (a) woman's body."
In another segment of the video, the counselor adds, "I think it's possible to be totally free of this."
The ABC News writeup of the story is here. The Bachmann campaign told "World News" that there are many types of services provided by the clinic, but they can't comment because of patient confidentiality.
The report is the latest in a string of headlines about Bachmann, whose record is relatively unvetted by the national press, amid a quick ascent in the polls.
UPDATE: Ramirez's account was first reported by The Nation last week.
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0711/58741.html#ixzz1Rsd9DPbS
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