A couple of months ago, at the CPAC shindig in Orlando, far right Wyoming state Senator Anthony Bouchard was a guest on Dad Talk Today. An advocate of shared parenting in divorces, he somehow forgot to mention he knocked up a 14 year old girl (statutory rape), who gave birth to a son and 4 years later, then Bouchard's wife, committed suicide after Bouchard divorced her in a "bitter" proceeding.
Bouchard is the Matt Gaetz-backed candidate against Liz Cheney. Gaetz, who also has a well-known hankerin' for underage women, flew out to Wyoming to campaign for Bouchard, a car mechanic, real estate agent, septic tank cleaner and founder of Wyoming Gun Owners. Bouchard was a frequent candidate for political office and finally got lucky in 2016 when he defeated a more establishment candidate by 5 votes.
Bouchard was 18 when he raped the 14 year old and, after keeping this episode secret for his entire political career, finally admitted it yesterday when the news leaked out. In this Facebook video he said "girl gets pregnant... She was a little younger than me, so it's like the Romeo and Juliet story," rather than just coming out and saying he impregnated her. He tried turning it into an anti-abortion issue, of course. And yesterday, he tried painting it as "a message about how dirty politics is." Not a very self-aware guy... but, if course not-- he's a Republican.
The Casper Star-Tribune reported that "Bouchard’s ex-wife killed herself when she was 20, he said. Online records list a woman with her name as being buried at a Jacksonville, Florida, cemetery in 1990. The Star-Tribune is choosing not to identify her. 'She had problems in another relationship. Her dad had committed suicide,' Bouchard said in the video. After his ex-wife died, Bouchard said he continued to raise the couple's son, whom he briefly references in the video. 'Sadly, he's made some wrong choices in his life,' he said. 'He's almost become my estranged son. Some of the things that he's got going on his life, I certainly don't approve of them. But I'm not going to abandon him. I still love him. Just like when he was born.'"
Bouchard said he decided to post a video to get ahead of a story about his previous marriage that he anticipates will be published sometime soon. In the video, Bouchard claims that an unnamed reporter and a “political opposition research company” were driving the effort together.
“We know the company that started this investigation. It's a political opposition research company. We know who they are and then it turned into a U.K. media reporter, is who's called me,” he said.
Bouchard said he did not respond to the media outlet.
"This is really a message about how dirty politics is," said Bouchard, one of Wyoming's most prominent gun rights advocates. "They'll stop at nothing, man, when you get in the lead and when you're somebody that can't be controlled, you're somebody who works for the people. They'll come after you. That's why good people don't run for office."
...In his Twitter post linking to the video, Bouchard concluded: ”I won't back down, Swamp! @RepLizCheney Bring it!” And in Thursday's video, he said the people digging up the information only "care about ... helping people like Liz Cheney win." But in his conversation with the Star-Tribune, Bouchard said he believes Cheney was not involved in the attempts to publicize the story, which Cheney's campaign echoed early Friday.
"The Cheney campaign had no involvement in this at all," said Jeremy Adler, her spokesman.
Bouchard said the disclosure about his past relationship and the pregnancy wouldn't stop him from seeking office.
“Bring it on. I'm going to stay in this race," he said. "We're going to continue to raise money because my record stands on its own.”
Aside from Bouchard, there are around a dozen other Republicans in the race against Cheney, including state Rep Chuck Gray, former Trump Regime bureaucrat Perry Pendley, Wyoming Secretary of State Ed Buchanan, former Pavillion mayor Marissa Selvig, Christian Broadcasting Network executive Darin Smith, Bryan Miller, chair of the Sheridan County GOP and various random people, mostly just vanity candidates. Bouchard was considered the frontrunner. So far, the Democrats have no candidate in the race.
Trump beat Biden in Wyoming 193,559 (69.9%) to 73,491 (26.5%), Trump winning 21 of the state's 23 counties. It was the #1 Trumpiest state in the country.