Berg Campaigns With SD Senator - KXNet - Bismarck/Minot/Williston/Dickinson

Berg Campaigns With SD Senator

The Republican who hopes to become a US senator brought a sitting senator to the state to campaign with him today.

Rick Berg welcomed John Thune of South Dakota to Minot.

The pair met with Task Force 21 - the Minot group working to maintain the base into the future.

The two men say Democrat Heidi Heitkamp is soliciting and accepting campaign donations from a group they say wants to get rid of nuclear weapons - a move they say could mean the closure of Minot Air Force Base.

Thune says the Council for a Livable World is not the kind of group lawmakers should seek out.

(Sen. John Thune -R- SD) "It clearly is something if you're a member of Congress you wouldn't want to associate yourself with if you believe, as Rick does and I do, that you've got to have that nuclear deterrent. And clearly his opponent in this race has gone out of her way to solicit contributions from the group that has that as their agenda and that should be very troubling to North Dakotans."

(Rep. Rick Berg -R- Candidate for US Senate) "One of the issues that came out of the Task Force 21 meeting is the risk we've got from radical groups that want to shut down nuclear weapons and have a total misconception of how we strengthen America -keep out of wars, rather than weaken our defense system. "

Democrat Heidi Heitkamp's campaign sent us a statement in response, saying Berg is trying to district from his vote for cutting 500-billion dollars from defense programs. The statement says the Council for a Livable World has supported Senators Kent Conrad and Byron Dorgan in past elections.