WASHINGTON -- A group of high-profile tea party Republicans are overseas this week on a taxpayer-funded trip to Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, Israel, Austria and Norway. GOP Reps. Michele Bachmann (Minn.), Steve King (Iowa) and Louie Gohmert (Texas) arrived in Egypt on Saturday for the weeklong congressional delegation trip, or CODEL for short, The Huffington Post has learned.
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Once the group of four departs the Middle East for Vienna on Thursday, their itinerary shifts somewhat, as they prepare to meet with right-wing political figures in Europe. In Austria, this will reportedly include a visit with Karlsboeck, a member of the Austrian Parliament from the far-right Freedom Party of Austria. As a conservative populist party, the FPO has been criticized throughout Europe for its xenophobic and anti-Muslim rhetoric.
A spokesman for the Austrian Embassy in Washington said the embassy had no part in arranging meetings for Bachmann, King, Gohmert or Pittenger.
FPO members describe themselves as "pro-Austrian," instead of anti-foreigner, but according to Reuters, the party "continues to attract a neo-nazi fringe which has no other party to join and warns continually of an 'Islamicisation' of Catholic Austria."
Bachmann has long worried about what she describes as an "infiltration" of American government by radical Muslims. The most high-profile example of this was her attack on Hillary Clinton adviser Huma Abedin. She and Gohmert were both among a small group of House members who raised questions in a 2012 letter about "the Muslim Brotherhood and other radical groups' access to top Obama administration officials."
Bachmann has also reportedly requested a lunch with Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff, an Austrian anti-Islam activist and lecturer who was convicted of hate speech in 2011. Sabaditsch-Wolff was fined under Austrian law for vilification of religious theories, such as saying that the Quran was "evil" and that "Muslims want war." In the United States, however, she has been accepted in mainstream conservative circles, appearing in 2010 at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/19/michele-bachmann-libya_n_4475486.html
