Michele Bachmann Swiss Citizenship Causes Stir: Will She Run for Office?
Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann has received her Swiss citizenship, which would allow her to run for political office in the country. After a failed bid for the United States presidency, will she run in Switzerland?
It seems unlikely that she will run, as she told Swiss TV, the competition "would be very stiff because they are very good." Yet that won't stop her from enjoying the perks of being a dual citizen in the country. "It's tough to find a place not to like in Switzerland," she said.
The decision for Bachmann to apply for citizenship in another country came after years of being married to her husband, Marcus, who is Swiss. He registered with the foreign government earlier this year, giving Michele the green-light for her own dual citizenship.
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"Congresswoman Bachmann's husband is of Swiss descent, so she has been eligible for dual-citizenship since they got married in 1978. However, recently, some of their children wanted to exercise their eligibility for dual-citizenship so they went through the process as a family," her spokesperson told CNN.
The Bachmanns' three youngest children are all now dual-citizens, and her two oldest can apply for citizenship whenever they are ready. "My husband is 100 percent Swiss, and his parents were raised in Switzerland, they were married there, they came to the United States, they bought a farm in Wisconsin and raised their three sons there," Bachmann told Swiss TV.
While Bachmann is happy to announce her citizenship, many here in the U.S. are questioning her loyalty and patriotism to the country where she already holds political office.
"So where do her loyalties lie?" asked Richard Craig Friedman. "She should not be in Congress or hold any political position in this country," he wrote on USA Today's page.
"She 'loves' America so much that she applies to become a citizen of another country?" asked Vincent Earl Davis.
"Sounds like a conflict of interest issue," noted Randy Willis.
