Another Senate candidate with workers' comp problem

Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer
Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer is running for U.S. Senate as a DFLer. He is a peace and justice professor at the University of St. Thomas and a harsh critic of the war in Iraq.
MPR Photo/Mark Zdechlik

Another Democratic Senate candidate finds himself playing catchup on unpaid workers' compensation insurance.

This time it's Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer. Just two days after Al Franken was reported to have an unpaid $25,000 judgment in the state of New York, Nelson-Pallmeyer's campaign reported that it hadn't covered its employees.

Campaign manager Chris McNellis says Nelson-Pallmeyer didn't have full-time employees until the fourth quarter of last year.

McNellis, who recently took over as campaign manager, says she mistakenly thought the company that handled their payroll was taking care of workers' comp.

McNellis says the campaign now has the insurance for its six paid employees.

A Labor and Industry Department spokesman, James Honerman, says his agency hasn't looked into the matter yet. He says state law allows a penalty of up to $1,000 for each employee for each week they're uninsured.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)