The Orange County Chairman of the American Independent Party, Mark J. Seidenberg, was tapped for $15,000 in personal cash by Jim Gilchrist, to allow Gilchrist to post the bond that Judge Randell Wilkinson of the Orange County Superior Court required of him before he would make final the "partial" preliminary judgment order issued last week in the on-going "Minuteman" case over control of the organization.  

Gilchrist’s request for a writ of possession to regain control of Minuteman Project, Inc. assets was denied by the Judge, as was his request to enjoin Defendants Marvin L. Stewart of Long Beach, and Barbara Coe, and Deborah Courteney of Orange County, from claiming they are members of the Board of Directors of Minuteman.  But Gilchrist won a partial injunction against the Defendants to enjoin them from using his signature for fundraising or spending Minuteman funds, at least until a April 25 hearing, where appointment of a court receiver to manage the organization will be at issue.  Gilchrist opposes receivership, and the Defendants favor it.

Seidenberg claims he had just gotten off a flight back home from Dublin, Ireland, only to receive an urgent call from Gilchrist asking him to pay the $15,000 in cash he needed to post bond with the Judge.  Seidenberg says he paid the money over to "Gilchrist’s attorney’s trust account," and that attorney filed a paper this week notifying the parties that the $15,000 in cash had indeed been paid over to the court.

Besides being the County Chairman of the AIP, Seidenberg also serves as national committeeman for the AIP’s national party affiliation, the Constitution Party.  Wikipedia notes about the Constitution party that: "[c]onservative activist Alan Keyes and Minuteman Project co-founder Jim Gilchrist are affiliated with the party. At a December 2, 2006 conference of the Constitution Party in Concord, New Hampshire, Keyes discussed the increasing demise of the Republican Party and the need for the Constitution Party to be "ready" to create a "new possibility . . . for America."  The Constitution party, according to Wikipedia, "takes an ultra-conservative approach on moral issues and seeks to restore what it calls the "Biblical foundations" of "American jurisprudence.""  Seidenberg is one of the few members of the national committee of the party who are also Jewish.  Mark has engaged in a number of interesting activities over the years, including his work as a Board member of an organization named State Department Watch, where he was aggressive in opposing the Soviet Union’s policies in general, including in connection with claims to an arctic island known as "Wrangell Island."  While living in Washington, D.C. during the Reagan Administration, two agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation were apparently concerned enough about Mark to unfairly detain and cuff him at his apartment at the same time a White House State Dinner honoring Mikhail Gorbachov was held.  Mark’s unfortunate detention was the subject of two articles in the Wall Street Journal.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 29th, 2007 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.