Mother Jones
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On Wednesday, a trio of conservative operatives with close ties to Rand Paul and his father were indicted for their alleged role in an effort to purchase an influential Iowa Republican’s endorsement of Ron Paul during his 2012 presidential bid. Mother Jones has learned that one of these operatives, Dimitri Kesari, is also a target of a police investigation into a mysterious burglary last year at the Rhode Island home of a Ron Paul staffer who died in 2013. All that was taken, according to local police, was the deceased staffer’s laptop.
Kesari, who served as Ron Paul’s deputy campaign manager during the 2012 campaign, faces federal conspiracy, campaign finance, and obstruction of justice charges for his alleged involvement in paying more than $70,000 to then-Iowa state senator Kent Sorenson to switch his endorsement from Michele Bachmann to Ron Paul ahead of the Iowa caucuses. The burglary case involves the childhood home of one of Kesari’s colleagues on Paul’s campaign team, a young and well-known libertarian activist named Jared Gamble, who died in 2013 at the age of 26. Gamble had worked on both of Ron Paul’s presidential campaigns, as well as on Rand Paul’s 2010 senate bid. He also had a connection to Sorenson, whose 2008 campaign for Iowa state senate Gamble had assisted. Sorenson eventually acknowledged taking money from both the Paul and the Michele Bachmann campaigns and resigned his Iowa state senate seat. He pleaded guilty to federal campaign finance charges last summer and is awaiting sentencing.
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Indicted Ron Paul Aide Is Also the Target of a Police Investigation Into a Mysterious Burglary
