An Iowa television station has decided to keep a Democratic ad on the air after Republican Joni Ernst’s campaign demanded it be pulled, an indication that the station has found the ad to be accurate.
In a letter sent Friday to the television station KWQC in the Quad Cities region of Iowa, which was obtained by the Washington Examiner, Ernst’s counsel Ronald Jacobs called the ad by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee “demonstrably false.”
By law, campaign ads produced by third parties must be factual or TV stations airing them can be held liable for the misinformation. Candidates and their ads are not held to such a standard.
In the ad, a narrator asserts that 20,000 Iowa jobs have been outsourced. “But Joni Ernst wants to keep special tax breaks for corporations shipping jobs overseas,” the narrator says.
A clip follows of Ernst being asked whether she would support raising taxes for companies that outsource jobs. She responds, “No.”
“Joni Ernst even signed a pledge to protect their special tax breaks,” the narrator adds, “instead of protecting us.”
But Ernst’s campaign is taking issue in particular with the ad’s claim that Ernst “wants to keep special tax breaks for corporations shipping jobs overseas.”
“This is not a matter of opinion or interpretation — it is simply factually wrong,” Jacobs wrote. “As such, your station has a legal obligation to take this ad down immediately or face potential consequences.”
In his letter to KWQC, Jacobs argued that the DSCC’s ad is not accurate because of the distinction between “tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas” and “tax breaks for shipping jobs overseas.” The latter construction, used in the ad, implies an incentive for outsourcing, Jacobs argued.
Jacobs also took issue with the ad’s characterization of the Taxpayer Protection Pledge by Americans for Tax Reform, Grover Norquist’s the anti-taxation group, which promises no new taxes. Just because Ernst signed the pledge, Jacobs contended, she “is not required to keep tax breaks for a company that happens to outsource jobs.”
“Rather, the signer could eliminate those tax breaks by reducing the overall tax rate on all companies,” Jacobs wrote.
This question has emerged in campaign ads before.
A 2010 piece by Factcheck.org, cited by Jacobs, examined an attack ad against a Republican House candidate in Hawaii. The ad made the similar claim that signing ATR’s pledge “protects tax breaks for companies that send jobs overseas,” and Factcheck.org rated it false.
But, this time, Ernst’s campaign’s protestations have apparently fallen flat. KWQC has kept the DSCC’s ad on the air, implying that the station found the ad’s claims satisfactorily factual.
Ken Freedman, the station’s vice president and general manager, to whom the letter was addressed, did not respond to requests for additional comment.
Ernst is locked in a tight Senate race against Rep. Bruce Braley, a Democrat, the outcome of which could decide what party holds a majority in the Senate.
