John Wayne of Waterloo

After a campaign rollout heavily focused on her Iowa native creds, Michele Bachmann stumbles into one heck of a case of mistaken identity:

Advertisement Michele Bachmann kicked off her presidential campaign on Monday in Waterloo, Iowa, and in one interview surrounding the official event she promised to mimic the spirit of Waterloo's own John Wayne.

The only problem, as one eagle-eyed reader notes: Waterloo's John Wayne was not the beloved movie star, but rather John Wayne Gacy, the serial killer. Mrs. Bachmann grew up in Waterloo, and used the town as the backdrop for her campaign announcement, where she told Fox News: "Well what I want them to know is just like, John Wayne was from Waterloo, Iowa. That's the kind of spirit that I have, too" ... John Wayne, the movie legend, is in fact from Iowa and the John Wayne birthplace is a celebrated landmark — only it's in Winterset, which is a nearly three hour drive away from Waterloo.



Bachmann has run into this kind of trouble before, like when she confused Concord, N.H., with Concord, Mass., as the birthplace of the American Revolution. But this screw-up cuts a little deeper, given how relentlessly she's positioned herself as a hometown gal.

This article tagged under: Michele Bachmann

2012 Elections