A flurry of personal and legal revelations battering Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin yesterday raised new questions about Senator John McCain’s risky running mate pick.
Palin rocked the first day of the Republican National Convention on Monday by announcing that her 17-year-old unmarried daughter was pregnant, but that the girl would have the baby and marry the father.
It also emerged Palin had hired a lawyer to defend herself in a legislative probe into her alleged abuse of powers as Alaska governor and there were reports her husband Todd was arrested for drink driving more than 20 years ago.
PHOTO: EPA/ALASKA GOVERNOR’S OFFICE
Late on Monday, reports were also emerging that Palin had once been a member of the fringe Alaska Independence Party.
The revelations forced McCain’s camp to defend its vice presidential vetting operation of Palin, who was largely unknown nationally before the senator sent shockwaves through the political world by naming her last week.
McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds told CNN that McCain learned about the pregnancy of Bristol Palin during the vetting process before he chose her.
“He did not consider it a disqualifier,” Bounds said.
But questions about the thoroughness of the checks into Palin’s background were amplified by reports that a team of 12 Republican lawyers was heading to Alaska to perform extra scrutiny on Palin.
There was also fresh scrutiny into the so-called “trooper-gate” scandal in which Palin is accused of pressuring a police commissioner to fire a trooper who was divorced from her sister.
The governor has denied the allegations, describing them as “outrageous” and “false.”
The string of disclosures about Palin opened up the possibility that Democrats would further question her qualifications to serve as vice president and the judgment of McCain over her selection.
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