McConnell staffers were secretly recorded while discussing Judd's potential run. Secret tape: McConnell aides on Judd

Aides to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell discussed attacking Ashley Judd’s mental health if the actress had opted to challenge the Kentuckian in 2014, according to a secret audio recording.

“She’s clearly, this sounds extreme, but she is emotionally unbalanced,” a McConnell aide says on the recording, which was obtained and posted by the liberal magazine Mother Jones. “I mean it’s been documented. Jesse can go in chapter and verse from her autobiography about, you know, she’s suffered some suicidal tendencies. She was hospitalized for 42 days when she had a mental breakdown in the ’90s.”


McConnell himself is heard speaking at the beginning of the meeting, which features aides presenting a whole range of opposition research they were considering using against Judd. At one point, a person describes “a wealth of material” to use potentially against Judd, prompting laughter from those present.

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The veteran senator invokes an old arcade game to describe the campaign’s strategy for dealing with challengers.

“I assume most of you have played the, the game Whac-A-Mole?,” he said to laughter. “This is the Whac-A-Mole period of the campaign…when anybody sticks their head up, do them out.

Most of the discussion focuses on Judd’s liberal positions, including support for gay marriage and President Barack Obama’s health care reform law. It is unclear how long McConnell was present during the session, which took place on Feb. 2 in Louisville, Ky.

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In her 2011 autobiography, Judd writes that she checked into a rehab center for depression as an adult and says she considered suicide as a sixth-grader.

Judd ultimately opted not to challenge McConnell.

The audio recording was obtained by David Corn, the same reporter who first posted the infamous “47 percent” tape featuring then-GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney speaking disparagingly of President Barack Obama’s supporters.

“We’ve always said the Left will stop at nothing to attack Sen. McConnell, but Nixonian tactics to bug campaign headquarters is above and beyond,” Jesse Benton, McConnell’s campaign manager, said in a statement.

In a later statement, Benton said the campaign had asked the FBI to investigate how Mother Jones obtained the recording.

“Obviously a recording device of some kind was placed in Senator McConnell’s campaign office without consent,” Benton said. “By whom and how that was accomplished will presumably will be the subject of a criminal investigation.”

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Corn stood by the report, noting he contacted McConnell’s reelection campaign, senate office and campaign manager before the story ran.

“Our lawyers vetted the story,” he told POLITICO. “The story itself says we were provided the tape by a source who wishes to remain anonymous. You know this job. I really can’t say much beyond that.”