Meg Whitman Claims Her Campaign Ads Don’t Show Border Fence (They Do)

by Jon Bershad | 11:49 am, May 28th, 2010

» 7 comments

Politico writes an article today entitled “Immigration pushes Meg Whitman rightward,” detailing how primaries force Republican candidates to trend more and more conservative than their original intent (the piece focuses on immigration but there’s also John McCain’s DADT flip-flop). But it’s the first few paragraphs that contain the biggest kicker – Jonathan Martin recounts a discussion California GOP gubernatorial candidate Whitman had with the site in which she accused her opponent Steve Poizner of “playing hot-button politics with the divisive issue of immigration” by using images of a border fence, something she would never do. Oh really?

Unfortunately for Whitman, it turned out that the reporter had watched many more campaign ads than she had (actually, I suppose, that’s unfortunate for both of them). He quickly pointed it out in what the site describes (presumably employing massive understatement) as an “awkward exchange”:

“You haven’t seen an ad from me with the border fence,” Whitman told POLITICO. “That has been Steve’s campaign. My campaign has been around jobs and spending and education.”

Actually, the reporter reminded Whitman, her campaign ads do feature a shot of the fence—a potent image used by lots of Republican ads this year to show they are ready to crack down on illegal immigrants.

“I don’t think so,” Whitman replied.

It fell to the candidate’s press secretary to settle the dispute, correcting the boss and confirming the fence image.

We can’t really blame Whitman for not watching her own campaign ads (she’s probably to busy running her porn empire). However, below, you can see what she was missing. Yeah, only the slightest mention of a fence in there.

(Politico via HuffPo)

California gubernatorial race, campaign ads, Meg Whitman, Oh Politico, Politico, Steve Poizner

http://www.facebook.com/people/Kam-Fet/572005492 Kam Fet

Maybe she didn’t know. She has loads of people working for her. How do you expect her to know everything they do with her image.
Jon Bershad

Oh, I don’t think she’s lying at all. And, while someone should give a cursory glance to anything with their name on it, in this age where a new viral ad is popping up every day in tough races, I can’t really blame her for not having seen it.
Like the writer of the Politico piece, I just think it works more as a demonstration of how, in Primary season, candidates see their ideals getting over simplified and moved more to the extreme.
When she started that campaign, she never would have used the image in her ad and, as such, she assumed her staff was still going in that direction. But, as the immigration topic becomes more divisive, her campaign materials began moving away from her to catch up.
JunkJunk

Sarah Palin probably slipped that fence in while Meg wasn’t looking…
http://www.uselessbeauty.com Vidiot

Maybe she didn’t know. She has loads of people working for her. How do you expect her to know everything they do with her image.

Then perhaps, she shouldn’t be making categorical statements about what you will or won’t find in her ads.
http://PoliticalGlutton.com PoliticalGlutton

I think we might need a Special Prosecutor for this scandal which is clearly being covered up and an example of media malpractice!
Big_F-ing_Deal

That’s not a fence.

It’s an Enhanced Wooden Security Zone.
Integr8d

Her ads don’t have fences. Why? Because it’s a little hard to see mines buried in the sand;)