Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ralph Northam’s team maintained Thursday that it had nothing to do with a now-canceled ad showing a white truck driver running down a small group of minority children, even as Republican critics alleged otherwise.
“The Northam campaign did not authorize the ad nor did it see the ad before it was released,” spokesman David Turner told the Washington Examiner.
He added of Northam’s Republican opponent that “Ed Gillespie allegedly understands Virginia campaign finance rules and knows this is a bogus attack.”
The trucker commercial, which was produced by a progressive group called the Latino Victory Fund, was pulled this week after a terrorist attack by a motorist in New York City left eight people dead. It shouldn’t have taken a murder spree for the LVF to realize its ad was hot garbage, but we’ll take small victories where we can get them.
Prior to the LVF’s decision to yank the ad, critics on both sides had criticized it as crass and far beneath the dignity of the office for which Northam and Gillespie are running.
“The Latino Victory Fund ad was vile,” the Washington Post’s editorial board said this week.
The Democratic candidate ultimately agreed, even after promoting the commercial briefly, and his campaign distanced itself from LVF’s efforts in pretty clear terms.
“Ralph Northam would not have run this ad and believes Virginians deserve civility, not escalation,” a spokesman told the Post.
Keep in mind they said this before the LVF had even decided to cancel the commercial spot. So good on them.
Not so fast, said Phil Kerpen, founder and president of the conservative 501(c)(4) nonprofit group American Commitment.
“Ralph Northam claims he did not approve the racist murder truck ad, but his campaign reported it as an in-kind contribution,” Kerpen noted this week on social media.
He added, “Note that under Virginia law, reporting as an in-kind indicates it was coordinated. If he didn’t coordinate, it would be an independent expenditure, not an in-kind.”
Virginia law does indeed state the following:
To qualify as an in-kind contribution, the candidate or an agent of the candidate’s campaign committee must have either expressly requested or suggested to the person or committee that the expenditure be made, or the candidate or an agent of the candidate campaign committee must have material involvement in devising the strategy, content, means of dissemination, or timing of the expenditure.
Kerpen added elsewhere, “LVF files no reports because they only make coordinated expenditures. The campaign files. If Northam really doesn’t approve content of coordinated ads, it’s purely for deniability.”
He then noted that the LVF has not filed any disclosures.
“Outside groups only file for independent expenditures,” Kerpen told the Examiner. “Northam for Governor themselves filed the disclosure accepting the in-kind, and it specifically lists ‘media,’ not canvassing or data.”
In response to these objections, the Democratic campaign maintains simply that it neither saw the ad, nor approved it before it aired.
“In Virginia, groups must report in-kinds for activities like canvassing and data-sharing. Because there are no independent expenditures, and Latino Victory Fund has been sharing data with us, they had to report any activity involving the election as an in-kind,” Turner told the Examiner.
He added, in a more direct attack on their GOP opponent, “Dr. Northam is committed to unifying Virginians appeal to their hopes, rather than dividing them through fear. Let’s be clear though: Ed Gillespie has spent upwards of $9 million making obvious racial appeals. Ed Gillespie has stoked fear among Hispanic immigrants. The tone and tenor of Ed’s campaign has been nothing but division and fear mongering. We understand why they would feel this way after the millions spent on demonizing immigrants.”
We, too, have been critical of the Gillespie campaign’s focus on defending the state’s monuments to secessionists. That said, if Northam wants to play the civility card, he’s going to have to clean up his own game.
