Sen. Tom Cotton is back in the New York Times, this time with anti-Biden ads from his political action committee on the outlet’s website.
The Arkansas Republican made headlines last week after staff revolted against the paper’s decision to run an op-ed by the senator arguing for the use of military force to help local law enforcement deal with social unrest that grew after the death of George Floyd in police custody on Memorial Day.
“While we were concerned that the woke mob would stifle debate, it’s admirable that the New York Times will run these ads from Senator Cotton’s PAC,” an adviser for Cotton told the Washington Free Beacon.
The ad hits at former Vice President Joe Biden’s verbal gaffes and record on China, painting the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee as too confused to lead the country.
Cotton’s op-ed created a shock wave of condemnation from New York Times employees who said his views put black staffers at the paper’s lives in danger. Eileen Murphy, a New York Times spokeswoman, blamed a “rushed editorial process” on the publication, and the outlet slapped an editor’s note on the online version saying the headline “was incendiary and should not have been used.”
The paper announced over the weekend that James Bennet, the editor of its editorial page, had resigned.
Cotton hit back at the criticism, accusing the paper of being unwilling to listen to viewpoints that do not match their own. “In the face of the woke mob of woke kids that are in their newsroom, they tucked tail, and they ran,” he told Fox News last week.
Amid the controversy, Cotton’s campaign brought in nearly $200,000 and released a new digital ad mocking Biden.
Cotton, who is up for reelection this year, does not have a Democratic challenger.
