Grant Rodgers

grodgers@dmreg.com

Former state Sen. Kent Sorenson will spend up to 15 months in federal prison for his role in an Iowa caucus cash-for-endorsement scandal that ruined his political career and led to the convictions of three presidential campaign workers.

Senior U.S. District Judge Robert Pratt issued the sentence Tuesday morning, calling the former Republican lawmaker's crimes "the definition of political corruption."

The judge disregarded a recommendation from prosecutors that Sorenson be given a more lenient sentence — two years of probation and community service — for cooperating with investigators.

"People require that tangible and serious consequences meet those that abuse the public trust for personal gain," Pratt said.

Defense attorney F. Montgomery Brown told journalists after the hearing that Sorenson will not appeal the ruling. "He'll take it like a man," Brown said of the sentence.

The sentencing hearing was a dramatic end to a yearslong saga that began when Sorenson surprisingly endorsed libertarian-leaning Ron Paul just days ahead of the 2012 Republican caucus. Sorenson, a rising tea party star from Milo, had been a key supporter of Michele Bachmann and immediately denied allegations that he was wooed over to the Paul campaign with cash.

But an investigation uncovered evidence that three Paul operatives gave Sorenson $73,000 in exchange for the endorsement, secretly paying him through an audio/visual production company to keep the state senator's name off public campaign expenditure reports. Sorenson began cooperating with prosecutors in July 2014 after FBI agents searched his home. He testified in front of a grand jury and was a key witness at the Paul aides' trials on conspiracy and other charges.

As part of his cooperation, Sorenson pleaded guilty to two charges: a violation of federal election law and an obstruction of justice count for lying under oath during a deposition by a special prosecutor assigned to investigate the matter for the Iowa Senate Ethics Committee. Altogether, he could have faced 25 years in prison and $500,000 in fines.

Brown, the defense attorney, admitted that the prison sentence was surprising, given the recommendation from prosecutors in the U.S. Department of Justice's Public Integrity Section who handled the case. Sorenson, who smiled walking into the courthouse, showed little emotion as Pratt announced his sentence.

But members of Sorenson's family became visibly upset and angry. "Are you happy now?" one of his sisters said to reporters in the courtroom when Pratt made his ruling. Two women who identified themselves as Sorenson's daughters shouted obscenities at journalists waiting outside the building to speak with their father, and one attempted to block a television camera with her body as Sorenson exited.

Sorenson said nothing to journalists. Pratt allowed him to self-report once the Bureau of Prisons decides the facility where Sorenson will serve his sentence.

As the hearing got underway, prosecutor Richard Pilger said sentencing Sorenson to probation was necessary to show future defendants that cooperating with federal agents and prosecutors can result in a "fair" outcome. Pilger said prosecutors "took over his life," and that he dutifully testified in front of a grand jury and at two trials when asked.

The three Ron Paul operatives — campaign chairman Jesse Benton, campaign manager John Tate and deputy campaign manager Dimitri Kesari — were each convicted on a variety of charges after two trials in front of a different judge. Tate and Benton each received two years of probation, while Kesari was sentenced to spend three months in federal prison.

Pratt said a prison sentence was necessary for Sorenson because of the seriousness of the crime and the need to deter illicit activity among politics in the future.

Pratt pointed to several recent public corruption cases that garnered prison sentences for powerful public officials, including the case of former New York state assembly speaker Sheldon Silver. The longtime Democratic lawmaker was sentenced in May to spend 12 years in prison for convictions on fraud, extortion and money-laundering charges stemming from shady dealings with real estate developers and a medical researcher.

The judge also noted a Pew Research Center study that found 74 percent of Americans believe public officials put their own interests first, telling the courtroom that cases like Sorenson's erode the public's trust in government. He quoted President Theodore Roosevelt, who railed against corruption in a 1903 speech to Congress, saying "the exposure and punishment of public corruption is an honor to a nation, not a disgrace. The shame lies in toleration, not in correction."

Pratt said it was appropriate to give Sorenson a stiffer sentence than the three Ron Paul operatives because he was a sitting state senator at the time he accepted their money. "Political corruption is a threat to our democratic system of governance," he said.

The scandal forced Sorenson to resign from the Iowa Senate in October 2013 after the special prosecutor, Des Moines attorney Mark Weinhardt, issued a report finding that he broke ethics rules by also accepting payments from the Bachmann campaign. The report presented evidence that those funds were filtered to Sorenson through consulting firms.

In a statement to the judge, Sorenson gave a public apology to Weinhardt for lying during the Senate investigation. "I put politics before the truth," he said.

Sorenson also apologized to Iowa voters and said he's become a "different man" since resigning from office.

"I was cocky, arrogant and filled with misguided ideas," he said.