MSNBC anchor Craig Melvin called Sen. Bernie Sanders’s new ad prominently featuring former President Barack Obama “misleading” in an interview with a member of the senator’s campaign staff.
The self-proclaimed socialist attempted to draw himself closer to Obama in the ad, which included clips of the two leaders and various quotes from the former president praising Sanders. Melvin played a clip of the ad and asked Sanders deputy campaign manager Ari Rabin-Havt if it was sending a false message to voters because the audio of Obama was from a multitude of speeches.
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“You’ve taken the former president’s voice from different settings and edited that together, and you give the impression that President Obama is a Bernie guy,” Melvin said. “How is that not misleading?”
“I don’t think it’s misleading. They are President Obama’s words about Bernie Sanders,” Rabin-Havt began, but Melvin reiterated his stance that the argument was “disingenuous.”
“Is it disingenuous? They are his words about Bernie Sanders. How is that disingenuous?” the Sanders campaign spokesman retorted.
Since the ad was released earlier this week, Biden spokesman Andrew Bates has condemned it and noted that “no quantity of ads can rewrite history,” according to the New York Post. In response, the independent senator from Vermont acknowledged that he’s “not going to say he and I are best friends.”
“Words taken from literally, as I understand it, three or four different speeches, over a span of five or six years,” Melvin pointed out.
“Look, we run ads that show voters Bernie Sanders’s track record and contrast ourselves with our opponent,” Rabin-Havt replied. “This is an ad that shows Bernie Sanders’s track record and somebody else’s words about Bernie Sanders. It is a completely fair ad, one that shows an important aspect of Bernie Sanders’s legacy.”
