November 12-13, 2007 -- SPECIAL REPORT -- Arthur Herman Bremer released from prison -- just before the kickoff of 2008 presidential primary season
publication date: Nov 10, 2007
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November 12-13, 2007 -- SPECIAL REPORT -- Arthur Herman Bremer released from prison -- just before the kickoff of 2008 presidential primary season
A Sordid American History of Assassinations and Conspiracies
Arthur Herman Bremer pumped five bullets into Democratic presidential candidate and Alabama Governor George Wallace on May 15, 1972, on the eve of the Maryland primary, which Wallace won. On November 9, Bremer was released from the Maryland state prison in Hagerstown, eight weeks away from the Iowa presidential caucuses and the kick-off of the 2008 primary season. David Blumberg, the chairman of the Maryland Parole Commission, told the Washington Post that Bremer, who once reportedly wanted notoriety, now disdains it.
Bremer, who is now 56 (four years older than Wallace was when Bremer shot him at the Laurel Shopping Center in Maryland), is to remain under supervision until 2025 and "might" be prevented by the state from getting near "elected officials" or going to "political rallies." Bremer is supposedly required to reside in Maryland unless he receives permission to move to another state. However, it is unclear if Bremer is permitted to visit other states.
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Note on WJZ-TV video: Report states that Maryland officials are unsure if Bremer's electronic monitoring device is in place. News clip fails to mention Wallace later rejected segregationist past as early as the 1972 presidential campaign in favor of a Huey Long-like anti-corporation populist stance. (Long was assassinated in 1935 prior to a suspected presidential run in 1936).
President Ronald Reagan's attempted assassin, John W. Hinckley, Jr., whose family has close links to the Bush family, now enjoys extended stays with his family away from St. Elizabeth's psychiatric hospital in Washington, DC.
Hinckley was found not guilty of attempted assassination of the President of the United States by reason of insanity. Bremer, who rejected letters from the Wallace family expressing forgiveness, has never shown any remorse. Moreover, the Post story contains a grave error. It says that Bremer, in the weeks before he shot Wallace, was tracking President Nixon. In fact, Bremer was tracking other Democratic presidential candidates, including Hubert Humphrey. And there is evidence that Bremer was secretly working for the Nixon campaign through the auspices of White House aide Charles Colson and E. Howard Hunt, later to be arrested for the Watergate break-in.
Nixon had long engaged in dirty tricks against Wallace. In the 1970 Democratic gubernatorial primary, Nixon backed Wallace's opponent, incumbent Albert Brewer. Nixon also began an Internal Revenue Service investigation of the Wallace campaign's finances. Wallace eventually beat Brewer and was re-elected Governor.
In 1972, Nixon, aided by dirty tricksters Colson, Donald Segretti, and a young 21-year old Republican named Karl Rove, began a series of dirty tricks against Democratic candidates, including George McGovern, Humphrey, Ed Muskie, and Wallace.
Wallace dropped his American Independent Party, on whose ticket he ran for President in 1968, and rejoined the Democratic Party. With far right-wing Republican support, Wallace's old party was taken over by recently defeated California Republican Congressman John G. Schmitz. In the 1972 election, Schmitz won over 1 million votes, edging McGovern into second place in some Idaho counties.
Schmitz's sons are John P. Schmitz, George H. W. Bush's Deputy Counsel and brother-in-law of Florida ex-Governor Jeb Bush and Joseph Schmitz, former George W. Bush Pentagon Inspector General and now General Counsel for the Prince Group, the parent company of Blackwater USA. The elder Schmitz's daughter is Mary Kay Letourneau, who was jailed for statutory rape for having sex with her 13-year old male student.
In 1972, Wallace dropped much of his racist rhetoric and began campaigning as a populist. As a result, Wallace began to cut into Nixon's support base -- the so-called "Silent Majority" of urban blue collar and rural voters. When Wallace began Democratic primaries, Nixon and his campaign grew worried. After Muskie won Iowa and New Hampshire, Wallace won the keystone Florida primary, carrying every county in the state. Polls showed Wallace gaining strength in northern states. After he was shot, Wallace won not only Maryland, but Michigan, Indiana, Tennessee, and North Carolina. However, after he was shot, the Wallace campaign was over.
Wallace's 1972 Democratic primary results. Source: The American Experience, PBS.
The first Democratic presidential candidate to visit Wallace in his Silver Spring, Maryland hospital room was Shirley Chisholm, the African American congresswoman from New York. Ted Kennedy, Ethel Kennedy (Bobby Kennedy's widow), Humphrey, and McGovern all visited Wallace, who had been welcomed back into the Democratic fold.
McGovern asked Wallace for his endorsement but Wallace, knowing how that would hurt McGovern and damage his own base in Alabama, remained publicly neutral, although it is doubtful he voted for Nixon. In 1976, after losing the Democratic primary, Wallace, confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life, endorsed Jimmy Carter. Wallace soon rejected racist ideology and won re-election as Governor of Alabama with a majority of the African American vote.