Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann's campaign lost another high-ranking staff member on Thursday after that staffer defended another former Bachmann official's defection to a rival campaign. Wes Enos, Bachmann's political director, has left the campaign, spokeswoman Alice Stewart confirmed to NBC News on Thursday evening.
The resignation comes on the heels of last night's announcement by Iowa state Sen. Kent Sorenson, who had served as Bachmann's Iowa chairman, that he had stepped down from that position to support Texas Rep. Ron Paul's campaign instead.
Yesterday, Enos publicly defended Sorenson, an Iowa state Senator, against charges voiced by Bachmann that Sorenson had accepted money from the Paul campaign, in violation of state law. (This narrative is disputed by Sorenson himself.)
"I can't in good conscious watch a good man like Kent Sorenson be attacked as a sell-out," Enos told NBC News on Wednesday night, insisting that Sorenson felt personal loyalty to colleagues in the state legislature backing Paul.
A similar statement from Enos was released via the Ron Paul campaign shortly after midnight today.
Reached via text message today, Enos told NBC News, of his departure from the Bachmann campaign: "It was a mutual thing. I knew when I undermined [Bachmann's] statement last night that I effectively was tendering my resignation."
Enos adds he has no "ill will" toward Bachmann.
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