The Democratic National Committee has stopped running an ad that accused several well-known Republican lawmakers of voting to abolish Medicare. The ads were run in Dayton, Ohio, against House Republican Leader Rep. John Boehner; Cincinnati, against Rep. Jeanne Schmidt; Columbus, against Rep. Patrick Tiberi; Palm Springs, against Rep. Mary Bono Mack; and Milwaukee, against Rep. Paul Ryan. The ad, which began running over the Labor Day weekend, featured photos of several of those lawmakers, and said:
Republicans want to end Medicare. You heard right: Republicans actually voted to abolish Medicare for future generations.
One of the most important programs for seniors. America’s seniors have relied on Medicare for over 40 years, and Democrats are working to strengthen Medicare. But the plain truth is Republicans have opposed Medicare from the start. Their leaders have called for cutting Medicare, and now for killing it.
The Republican party: No friend of seniors.
The Democratic National Committee is responsible for the content of this advertising.
The DNC cited as evidence vote in March of this year in which the Republican lawmakers supported a long-range reform of Medicare. (The plan under consideration was, according to Factcheck.org, endorsed several years ago by the National Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare.) The bill would have preserved Medicare as it is today for anyone receiving benefits now, and for anyone who would be in line to receive benefits any time in the next ten years. For those younger than 55, it would have, again according to Factcheck.org, “called for the government to provide subsidies, equivalent to ‘100 percent of the cost of the Medicare benefit,’ for the purchase of private insurance ‘from a menu of Medicare-approved plans, similar to options available to Members of Congress.” Factcheck.org concluded that “there was no vote to ‘abolish,’ ‘kill’ or ‘end’ Medicare.”
On September 9, lawyers for the Republican National Committee sent a letter to Time Warner Cable, demanding that it stop running the “false” and “misleading” ad in Dayton. “The advertisement contains several willful misrepresentations of fact concerning Republican support for Medicare and Congressmen John Boehner’s record on Medicare reform,” the letter said.
Now, Democrats have pulled the ads. “The DNC television ads were simply dishonest,” an RNC spokesman said after the decision. “Like much of their rhetoric, their paid political ads were proven to be false and were quickly taken off the air.”
