Bachmann: 'Hardball' remarks urban legend

WASHINGTON, Nov. 20 (UPI) -- U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., says the televised remarks she made regarding patriotism was an "urban legend" and she didn't make them.

Bachmann, appearing Tuesday night on Fox News' "Hannity & Colmes" show at first denied that she suggested on a pre-election show of MSNBC's "Hardball" that President-elect Barack Obama, then the Democratic presidential candidate, and other members of Congress may be "anti-American" and that the media should investigate them, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported Thursday.

"It's an urban legend that was created," she said on the Fox program. "That isn't what I said at all."

When host Alan Colmes quoted her remarks expressing concern about Obama and saying the media should look at the views of congressional members, Bachmann said she wasn't qualified to determine the views of her fellow members.

"That's not my job to do that," she said. "What I was talking about is the mainstream media doing their job."

The comments put Bachmann's previously safe House seat at risk and helped her Democratic opponent Elwyn Tinklenberg to raise more than $1 million in contributions in just a week. She was re-elected.